


Of Treasure and Treachery

by barricadebutts



Category: Turn (TV 2014)
Genre: Abe is a bisexual treasure hunter, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Anna is a tech genius, M/M, National Treasure au, Rob is a doctor of historical documents, and the extent is the plot of National Treasure, slow burn to an extent
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-23
Updated: 2016-08-04
Packaged: 2018-07-26 07:25:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 24,854
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7565365
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/barricadebutts/pseuds/barricadebutts
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>‘The legend writ.<br/>The stain effected.<br/>The key in Silence undetected.<br/>Fifty-five in iron pen,<br/>Mr. Matlack can’t offend’</p><p>Or, a National Treasure au</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This has probably been the single longest work I've ever completed (It's nearly 25k words in its completed form)-- sorry in advance.
> 
> This fic follows the plot of National Treasure, so if you've seen that, you'll probably be good. If you haven't seen it, it's not necessary that you watch it before reading, but you should watch it because it was one of my favorite movies when I was small.
> 
> A few disclaimers before we begin:
> 
> Any and all inconsistencies with reality are due solely to the movie. I read over everything that was wrong with the movie, acknowledged it, and continued to write to the movie, not fact.
> 
> I took dialogue from the movie, so if you have seen it and something looks familiar, it's probably from the script.
> 
> Know that I refer to Benedict Arnold simply by his last name all but a total of two or three times this entire fic. Sorry.
> 
> I do not have a beta reader, but if anyone would at all be interested to beta read the chapters that aren't up yet, I'd be very grateful.
> 
> Without further ado, please enjoy and let me know what you think.

Abe’s colder than he’s ever been in his twenty-four odd years of life. Travelling through the wintry hellscape of Antarctica isn’t exactly how he thought his weekend was going to go, but here he is now with Anna, Arnold, Hickey, Bradford, and MacInnes in two Snow Cats. One clue had led to another, and the next thing he knew, they were all planning a trip down to the South Pole to find the ship that would set them one step closer to finding the mythical Freemason treasure hidden during the Revolutionary War in an effort to distract the British.

Anna’s sitting in the backseat on her laptop punching keys as well as can be expected with the thick gloves she’s got on; her jacket hood with fur around it is pulled up and down as far as it can go to try and avoid the icy wind that manages to get into the vehicle. She spouts off coordinates and tells them they’re getting closer to the indicated location of the ship they’re looking for.

“Are we almost there?” Arnold asks a few minutes later, voice raised to be heard above the roar of the wind and tires on snow.

Anna pulls her hood back minutely so that she can hear the message directed at her. “If Abe’s theory and my tracking is correct, we should be getting very close. Really any minute now.” Arnold nods stiffly from the front seat and looks back out at the white expanse.

“What if it’s not out there? What if the treasure isn’t even on the ship?” Anna leans forward in her seat to yell at Abe. Abe can hear the apprehension in her voice; that the entire trek was for nothing. One more dead end.

Abe twists in his seat to look back at her and smiles what he hopes looks reassuring. “Anna, you’re not missing that cubicle we found you in, are you? Because we can just turn around and go home now if you want to.” Anna laughs dryly before her computer makes a rather menacing noise.

“Guys, we’re here. Stop the vehicle.” Arnold radios to the other Snow Cat to stop; the silence is deafening once both engines are off.

“It doesn’t look like anything’s here,” Arnold remarks, cynicism lacing his voice.

“That’s because it’s buried.” Abe pushes the driver’s side door open and jumps out onto the solid packed snow. The wind is worse outside than he thought it would be. Sure, he knew it would be bad, he just didn’t expect _this_. He pulls his hood further forward to cover his face and walks a few feet in the general direction of where Anna said the ship is.

Bradford and the others walk up to the three of them, hoods pulled tight and snow goggles on. “Listen, how do you know it’s even here? How does a ship even get out into the middle of a solid land mass?” Bradford asks, tone gruff and agitated. Abe turns to Anna and lets her explain instead.

“Well, I'm no expert, but... it could be that the hydrothermal properties of this region produce hurricane-force ice storms that cause the ocean to freeze and then melt and then refreeze, resulting in a semisolid migrating land mass that would land a ship right around here. That enough of an explanation for you?” Bradford looks at her with squinted eyes and stomps away to go talk to Hickey and MacInnes. She smiles over at Abe triumphant and he just laughs and shakes his head.

Abe stands there for a minute, taking it all in until Arnold comes up behind him and nudges his shoulder with the handle of a metal detector. He turns around to be greeted by the towering six-foot man. “If it’s buried, we’d better start looking.” Abe nods and takes the machine from him to start looking.

“It’s a lot of snow…” Abe mumbles to himself as he begins the process of looking in the designated area. The others are already a little way away with their own metal detectors doing the exact same thing that he’s aiming to do.

In his solitude, Abe thinks back to the first time he heard about the treasure that he’s spent the last five years searching for. About how his great great great grandfather first learned of the mysterious ‘Charlotte’ that a secret supposedly lied with. He remembers sitting in the attic of his grandfather’s house looking through old boxes and learning about the secret treasure that the Freemasons hid from the British during the American Revolution. Abe, against his father’s wishes, had been fascinated ever since.

When he moves to his right a few inches, the metal detector begins to go off, causing Abe’s breathing to pick up. He moves further in that direction until the metal detector makes a continuous sound indicating that there’s metal beneath his feet. Abe falls to his knees and immediately begins digging with his pick ax and hands through the snow. The ax strikes metal and Abe hurriedly shuffles the snow away from the source. Clearing off enough snow, he sees the word ‘Charlotte’ and wonders if the tears in his eyes are from the wind or from relief.

Calling the rest of the crew over to him, they make a plan about how to move forward. They’ve got to uncover enough of it to get down into the hold of the ship, but they have no major tools, just a few shovels. Regardless, Abe and Arnold dole out responsibilities and get to digging.

It’s slow going at first. Based on the placement of the words that Abe found, Anna tells them the general direction that they should start digging in order to find a cargo hold entrance. They find one within three hours, and get down below deck within another. Abe finds that he doesn’t really care how long it takes because it’s real. Charlotte is real, and his family isn’t as crazy as historians throughout the years have said. _His family isn’t crazy._

Arnold leads everyone below deck first because he wants to be the first one down, the first one to see the possible treasure. Anna and Abe are towards the middle of the trail of people with Arnolds other men behind the two.

Everything is covered in a layer of ice and snow below deck. The dining tables still have plates and cups on them, and the hammocks that served as beds look eerily undisturbed. Abe feels like he’s walking through a ghost town, and part of him wants to turn back.

Anna’s looking at the hammocks much closer than Abe is when he hears a gasp and the sound of hundred-year-old wood straining as Anna steps back suddenly and trips on an uprooted board. Abe looks down at what she gasped at and sees a corpse in a hammock with its mouth open almost in shock. He looks at Anna making her way to her feet and huffs out a single syllable of laughter. “You handled that well.” Anna huffs and gets all the way to her feet, dusting snow off of her arms.

From across the room, Arnold makes the announcement that he’s found the doors to the cargo hold. Abe gives Anna one last look before walking over to the iced over doors. With Abe’s help, Arnold’s able to pry open the doors with their pick axes and pull them open.

The cargo hold feels even bleaker than the living quarters did. There’re countless barrels covered in ice and snow. Arnold walks up to one and breaks the top open with his ax. “You think it’s in the barrels?” Abe shrugs and walks through the small area, looking at the few dead bodies still lying on the floor. He hears Arnold state that the contents are gunpowder.

Abe makes his way to one body in particular that was most likely the captain when the ship still floated. He’s clutching a barrel to his long decayed chest in a presumably last ditch effort to protect whatever’s inside. “Now what could be in this barrel that’s so important that the captain would guard it?” Abe wonders to himself. He carefully pries the captains fingers off and opens the lid with his pick ax. Gun powder spills out when he turns the barrel on its side, but so does a medium sized cloth covered box. Abe’s hopes skyrocket.

“Hey guys, I found something,” he yells to the others. Abe stands up with the box and rushes to the snow covered table situated in the middle of the room. Slowly unwrapping the cloth, Abe sees the silver of what must be the actual box beneath. On the top of the lid are three embossed plates that take Abe’s breath away. Inside, a white Meerschaum pipe with a carving a ship’s stern sits on a bed of velvet.

“Is that a pipe?” Anna asks, looking over Abe’s shoulder at the contents of the box.

Arnold sighs in contempt. “It would appear that way. What now?” 

“There’s uh, there’s a scroll on the side right here.” Abe points at the piece where the ship ends before the wood. He pulls the pipe apart and Anna jumps slightly. “It’s another clue towards the treasure; we’re one step closer.”

“I thought you said the treasure would be on the ship? That this would be it.” Arnold sounds angry, so Abe prepares himself for a fight of some kind. It’s not like he didn’t see this coming. Arnold’s temper is short enough on a good day; it’s even shorter when he misunderstands directions and missions.

Taking a breath, Abe prepares for the worst. “No, I said _‘the secret lies with Charlotte’_. I said it _could_ be here, not that it would be.” He runs a hand over his hat covered head and sighs, thinking about what to do next. Before anyone can say anything else, he takes one of his gloves off and the knife out of his back pocket to cut a favorable gash in his thumb. Anna sucks in a breath between her teeth, but Arnold and the others don’t make a sound.

Smearing the blood onto the scroll end of the pipe, Abe then rolls it down the page of a small notebook that Anna produces for him. Albeit bloody, the wording is fairly legible. _“‘The legend writ. The stain effected. The key in Silence undetected. Fifty-five in iron pen, Mr. Matlack can’t offend’._ It’s a riddle; hang on, I need to think.” Setting the book down onto the box, Abe walks a few feet away muttering to himself. “The legend writ…key in Silence…”

“What does that mean, Woodhull?” Arnold asks, impatient.

Abe squats down on a barrel and taps his chin, holding up his index finger to effectively silence Arnold. “Legend… key… Maps have legends, maps have keys. It’s a map.”

“A map? Wouldn’t a map to a hidden treasure be noticed already?” Arnold asks.

“It would have had to be invisible then. An invisible map. ‘ _The stain effected’_ could refer to a dye or a reagent to make it visible again.”

“Prison,” Bradford interjects suddenly. Anna looks up at him, startled.

“What?”

“’55 in iron pen’. That’s where it is, it’s in a prison,” Bradford says, inputting his own thoughts into the riddle.

Abe thinks before replying. “Or it could refer to the ink they used to use, iron gall ink, and the pen would be… just a pen.”

“Then why not just say so?” Anna deadpans from she’s sat down on a barrel of gun powder.

“Because the iron isn’t describing the ink. It’s describing _what_ was penned. It was firm, it was adamant. ‘Mr. Matlack can’t offend’. Timothy Matlack was the official scribe of the Continental Congress. Calligrapher, not writer. And to make sure he could not offend the map, it was put on the back of a resolution that he transcribed, a resolution that 55 men signed. The Declaration of Independence.”

The room is silent for several moments as Abe’s words sink in. It’s a hefty accusation to make, to say the Declaration of Independence has a map on the back of it in secret ink. Still though, if the clues work out to be what he’s just said, then the truth is there.

Anna’s nervous laughter fills the silence of the hold. “Come on, there’s no map on the back of the Declaration of Independence. Right?”

“No, that’s clever,” Arnold says, tapping his finger on the table. “Putting the map on a document like that would ensure its survival. And you said at least nine Masons signed it?” Abe nods his head, and Arnold beams. “We’ve got to arrange for a way to see it.”

“That’s one of the most important documents in American history. They’re not just going to let us waltz in there and just run chemical tests on it,” Anna says like it’s a no brainer. And in a way, it is. In a way, the treasure hunt most likely will legally end here. Anything past finding out the map is on the back of the Declaration will most likely be done illegally.

“Then what do you propose we do, oh great one?” The remark is meant as a jab to Anna, but Abe can tell it doesn’t hurt like it’s meant to. “We could borrow it,” Arnold says after a moment, causing both parties to pause to look at him.

Abe looks affronted. “Steal it? I don’t think so.”

“Abe… The treasure of the Knights Templar is _the_ treasure of all treasures!”

“Oh, I didn’t know that. Really?”

“Look Abe, I understand your bitterness. I really do. You've spent your entire life searching for this treasure, only to have the respected historical community treat you and your family with mockery and contempt. You should be able to rub this treasure in their arrogant faces, and I want you to have the chance to do that.”

Abe sighs and puts his head in his hands. He looks across the table at Anna to see that she’s giving him a look, but he doesn’t have the energy to decipher it right now. “How?”

“We all have our areas of expertise. I used to do things of questionable legality before taking a more civilized path. So don’t worry, I’ll make all the arrangements, and this can happen. We’ll get you your treasure, Abe.”

Anna looks alarmed sitting across the table, but Abe doesn’t need to look at her to know that he’s feeling the exact same way. This cannot happen under his consent; it will not. “No.”

Arnold straightens at the negative remark and doubles down on his efforts. “Abe, I’d really like your help with this.”

“I told you no, Arnold. There’s no way that I’m going to let you steal the Declaration of Independence.”

“Alright then.” Bradford pulls out a gun from his pocket and points it at Abe. “From here on out, you will be a hindrance to me. You won’t help me, so therefore, you’re against me.”

Anna shouts expletives at Arnold, but he ignores them. “You can’t shoot me,” Abe tries, buying time while he thinks up a lie. “There’s more to the riddle that you don’t know. There’re more clues that only I can figure out. You know that.”

Arnold hums affirmatively and nods his head towards Bradford. Bradford turns his gun on Anna, and Abe hears the safety click off and he knows he doesn’t have a lot of time. “If we can’t kill you, we can still kill Anna.”

“Hey!” Anna protests.

“Quiet, Anna! Your job is done here.”

Thinking quick, Abe takes a spare flare out of his pocket, and quickly ignites it while Arnold is distracted with yelling at Anna. The noise redirects his and Bradford’s attention back towards Abe. He can read the panic in both of their eyes, as well as hear it in Anna’s questions. “Look down at where you’re standing. There’s gunpowder everywhere. You shoot me, I drop this and we all go up. You shoot Anna, I drop this, we all still go up. What happens when this flare burns down?”

“Tell me what I need to know Abe.” Arnold is getting less and less patient as the flare burns.

“What we need to know… is if Bradford can catch.” Abe throws the flare at Bradford, who drops his flashlight to catch the flare. The moment is anticlimactic to say the least. Abe isn’t expecting Bradford to catch it, but he does. The look Bradford displays is one of victory until a spare spark catches his cheek and he reflexively drops the flare into the snow.

Arnold, forgetting about Bradford’s gun, shoves him to the exit of the cargo hold. Abe doesn’t have time to follow him, so he yells at Anna to get over to where he’s standing. He finds a hatch to the smugglers’ hold and opens it up, Anna climbing down as fast as she can. All they can do is hope that the explosion from the gun powder is enough to harm Arnold and his men, but leave Abe and Anna alone.

When the ship does blow, it’s the loudest thing Abe’s ever experienced. It’s very possible that he could have just lost his hearing, but the biggest thing he’s thinking right now is that he’s survived. Anna survived. Debris rains down for a few minutes before Abe cautiously pushes open the remains of the door to the smugglers’ hold. There isn’t much ship left to see, and both snow cats are gone into the distance with Arnold and his men safely aboard.

Abe looks to Anna, who is still visibly shaken, and pats her on the back. “There’s an Inuit village about nine miles east of here. It’s popular with bush pilots.”

“Alright. And then what are we going to do?”

Abe shrugs as if it’s obvious. “We start marking our way home.”

“No, I meant about Arnold. He’s going to steal the Declaration of Independence, Abe.”

“Simple. We’re gonna stop him.” 

\----

It’s the third office they’ve visited and they’re still no closer to getting a government agency to believe them. No matter which way Abe and Anna try and spin the story, no agency thus far has bought the story that someone’s going to try and steal the Declaration of Independence. They told them it couldn’t be done, that it was impossible. Anna had tried not to scream multiple times. So now they’re back on the street in D.C. thinking of who else to go to. Abe’s patience is wearing thin. The longer it takes to get an agency to believe them, the closer Arnold gets to stealing the document—however he’s planning to do it.

Anna wants to scream walking out of the FBI’s office. Abe tries to play cool but he’s frustrated as all hell too. “The FBI gets thousands of tips a day, they’re not going to follow up on a tip that seems so absurd,” Abe tries to placate to no avail.

“Well then, Mr. Optimistic, what do you suppose we do now? Anyone that would even think to help us would have to be crazy.” Abe smiles internally at Anna’s sass.

“We haven’t tried everywhere yet. Take one step below crazy and what do you get?” Abe starts walking down the pedestrian heavy sidewalk and Anna runs to catch up.

“Obsessed!” she yells after him, weaving around a couple who step in between her and Abe. 

Abe shakes his head and turns to look at her briefly. “Passionate! Let’s go, we’ve got an appointment.”

\----

They find themselves at the National Archives. The two have been inside the building to see the Declaration many times, but never back behind the scenes into the offices. The waiting room is slightly stuffy, and there’s a pile of pamphlets on the coffee table advertising the National Archives Anniversary Gala. Abe reaches over Anna and grabs one, flipping through the pamphlet to pass the time.

A few minutes later, a small woman opens the door across from them to let Mr. Brown know that Dr. Townsend will see him now. Anna looks confused when Abe stands up, so he quickly explains that his last name doesn’t exactly get a lot of credit in the academic community. It’s a fact that Abe’s trying hard to change with this treasure hunt.

Dr. Townsend is on the phone when they walk into his office, and the first thing Abe notices is that he’s a lot younger than he expected. In all honesty, Abe had expected an older man in his forties or fifties, not a man seemingly in his late twenties.

Townsend hangs up relatively quickly and almost grimaces at Abe and Anna stood in front of him. He gets up to greet them, walking around his desk to shake both of their hands. “Robert Townsend,” he says and shakes Abe’s hand.

“Paul Brown,” Abe says without wavering. Robertsmiles politely and looks to Anna.

“Elizabeth,” she supplies swiftly.

“Pleasure to meet both of you.” The exchange is short and brief as Robert goes back to sit behind his desk. Abe wanders to the mantle above the fireplace to look at the buttons displayed in a case. He goes to touch one before Robert yells at him. “Please don’t touch those!”

“I’m so sorry. It’s just, this is an extremely well put together collection of Washington’s campaign buttons. You’re just missing the one from his 1789 Inaugural. It’s a shame. I ran into one once.”

Robert nods along with what Abe’s saying, but Abe can tell the other man is doing it more for Abe’s confidence than his own. “That’s very fortunate of you. You told my assistant that this was an urgent matter so please, what can I do for you two?”

Abe stutters and looks to Anna for help. “Uh… we have it on good authority that the Declaration of Independence is going to be stolen,” Abe rushes out. The look on Robert’s face tells all.

Robert looks over to Anna, but all Anna can think to do is confirm Abe’s claim. “It’s true.”

Robert coughs and stares down at his hands for a split second. “I think I’d better put you two in contact with the FBI. They’re more suited to handle something like this than I am.” He goes to reach for the phone on his desk before Abe stops him.

“We’ve already been to the FBI,” Abe begins.

“They assured us there was no possible way that the Declaration could be stolen,” Anna finishes.

Robert looks between the two of them and unclasps his hands. “They’re right,” he supplies almost unnecessarily. A part of Abe wants to punch the smug look off of his face right about now.

Abe sits straighter in his chair, readying his next point. “We’re less certain. If we were given the opportunity to examine the document and look over it, we’d be able to tell you if it was in any danger.” Robert looks between them with a face full of mirth, and sits back in his chair.

Laughter is evident in Robert’s voice when he speaks to Abe and Anna again. It’s very clear that he’s not taking them very seriously. Arnold and his men are probably out there this very second planning on how to steal this document for their own gain, but this Robert Townsend is barely giving them the time of day. “What do you think you’re going to find?”

Abe sucks in a breath and steels himself. “We believe there’s an encryption on the back. A… cartograph… if you will." 

“You think there’s a map on the back of the Declaration of Independence?” Abe nods hesitantly and Robert looks up at the ceiling as if looking for a sign from some higher power to give him the strength to deal with him and Anna right now. “A map to what?”

“A map to some historic items of significant monetary value.” Abe knows beefing up his vocab isn’t going to get him very far, but he tries anyways.

It doesn’t work. “A treasure map? You’re treasure hunters?”

“And that’s where we lost the FBI,” Anna mutters to herself as if keeping a score card of how far they’re able to get with this agency. Abe throws her a look anyway.

“We prefer the term ‘treasure protectors’, but yes, essentially.”

Robert nods and sighs. “Mr. Brown, I’ve seen the back of the Declaration many times myself, and I can _promise_ you that there is nothing on the back of that document besides a seal that’s dated the fourth of July, 1776. And you know what’s not on the back of that document?”

Abe doesn’t know why he answers the question, but the answer comes out anyway. “A map.”

“A map,” Robert repeats redundantly. 

Abe looks at Anna to see that she’s shaking her head very slightly, a sign that Abe should stop, that he shouldn’t go on to tell his next bit of information that will no doubt get them ejected from Robert’s office. “That’s because it’s invisible,” Abe interjects as Robert reaches for the phone on the edge of his desk. Abe’s certain that he’s about to call his assistant back in to escort the two of them out.

Instead, Robert looks back at Abe and Anna again and raises his eyebrows in disbelief. “Oh, okay, yeah. That makes a lot of sense.”

“And that’s where we lost the Department of Homeland Security,” Anna mutters to Abe again. If they can get past Robert’s skepticism, they’ll be further than they have been with the other agencies.

“What led you to believe there was a map on the back of the Declaration?”

“We uh… we found an engraving on the back of a 200-year-old pipe with a riddle on it.”

“It was carved by Freemasons,” Anna supplies helpfully. Abe gives an affirmative gesture towards Anna, letting Robert know that it’s that much more reliable.

This seems to pique Robert’s interest a little more as he sits further up in his chair than he was moments ago. “May I see this pipe?” 

Abe’s spirits sink. They lost the pipe to Arnold when he threatened to kill them in the hull of the ‘ _Charlotte’_ down in Antarctica. It’ll be that much harder to convince him of it now. “We don’t actually have it. It was stolen from us by some ex co-workers.”

Robert nods and leans forwards conspiratorially. “Are you sure Bigfoot didn’t take it?”

Anna huffs out the breath she was holding and stands up abruptly, pulling Abe by his shirt sleeve. “It was nice meeting you, Mr. Townsend. Have a good day.”

“Nice to meet you too.”

As Anna walks back out into the waiting room, Abe turns around and tries to throw out one more gesture of kindness. “You know, that really is a nice collection. It must have taken you a long time to collect all that history.” As Abe turns around, he doesn’t see the little smile that Robert produces at the compliment.

\----

Back outside in the rotunda with all of the documents, Abe sighs and runs a hand through his hair. He walks over to the display case where the Declaration sits behind its layers of glass and alarms. They were so close to getting someone to believe in them, getting someone to actually do something to protect this document that Arnold was going to try and steal. Nevertheless, they had practically been laughed at much as they had been at the other two agencies.

Anna walks up behind him and lays a hand on his shoulder in comfort. “If it’s any consolation, you had me convinced. I think you did a good job in there.”

Abe sighs. “It’s not.” Anna nods and stands there with him in silence for several minutes, staring at the 240-year-old text. “180 years of searching and this is as close as I get. We’re three feet away from it, and we can’t do anything about it. The Declaration states that if there’s something wrong, those who have the ability to take action, have the responsibility to take action.”

“Wait, what are you saying?” Anna’s tone has shifted into something of concern. It’s slightly disconcerting to hear Abe talk about doing something when the two of them can’t realistically do a thing to stop Arnold.

“I’m saying I’m gonna steal it. I’m gonna steal the Declaration of Independence.” Anna looks at him like he’s a crazy man, and Abe can’t really blame her. He did just say that he was going to steal arguably one of America’s most important documents out loud, in the place where said document is held. 

Abe walks away from the glass case, not even bothering to see if Anna’s following him. Anna spends about a minute there before she composes herself enough to run after Abe and out the doors.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This was originally only going to be somewhere near three or four thousand, and now it's closer to six... sorry about that.
> 
> In this chapter we're introduced to Andre, along with background Ben and Caleb.
> 
> Also, I tried to match up locations from the film to their real life locations and names, so that was fun that I'll never do again, because it was actually hell. Don't ever try and follow movie locations to write an au.
> 
> Things that would not happen in real life happen in this because that's how the movie played it out, my apologies.
> 
> I still don't have a beta, just fyi.
> 
> Anyways, here we are. Enjoy and let me know what you think.

“You realize you’ll go to prison, right?” Anna presses, the minute she gets close to him again. They’re walking towards the Penn Quarter metro station that will inevitably take them towards the Library of Congress where it’ll be no less populated than the street they’re on now, and even more dangerous to talk about their current topic of conversation. If Abe wants to talk about stealing a major historical document, they should honestly do it in private.

Without saying anything, Abe nods and continues walking. He weaves between people, but they pay Anna and him no mind.

"So that would _bother_ most people, Abe.” 

“Look, Anna, Arnold’s going to steal the Declaration. There’s no way around it. He’ll steal it and then destroy it. The only way to protect it, is to steal it. It’s upside down.” Anna nods as if he’s not entirely wrong, but as if he’s completely lost his mind. “I don’t think there’s a choice.”

Anna jogs to get in front of Abe, and then stops him in his tracks so that he’ll listen to her words. “Abe, listen to me. It’s like stealing a national monument, okay? It can’t be done. Not that it shouldn’t be done, but that it can’t. Let me prove it to you.” Abe nods and Anna visibly exhales a breath of relief.

\---- 

Inside the Library of Congress, tourists browse the shelves of the world’s largest library. It honestly take’s Anna’s breath away every time she steps into it. Sometimes she comes to the library to simply relax, other times to work in quiet. Today though, her mission isn’t for pleasure, it’s for educating Abe and making him see that his plan is fucking stupid.

She retrieves her desired book from its designated shelf, and the two of them sit down at the bank of desks so that Anna can educate her student of the day.

“Okay, Abe, pay attention. I’ve brought you to the Library of Congress. Why? Because it's the biggest library in the world. Over a million books. And they're all saying the same exact thing: listen to Anna.

“What we have here, my friend, is an entire layout of the archives. Short of builders' blueprints. You've got construction orders, phone lines, water and sewage—it's all here. Now, when the Declaration is on display, okay, it is surrounded by guards and video monitors and a little family from lowa and little kids on their eighth-grade field trip. And beneath an inch of bulletproof glass is an army of sensors and heat monitors that will go off if someone gets too close with a high fever. Now, when it's not on display, it is lowered into a four-foot-thick concrete, steel-plated vault... that happens to be equipped with an electronic combination lock and biometric access-denial systems.”

Abe looks down at the book Anna has shoved in his face and pushes it slightly away. He straightens up and runs a hand through his hair before speaking. “You know, Thomas Edison tried and failed nearly 2,000 times to develop the carbonized cotton-thread filament for the incandescent light bulb?"

“Edison?” Anna isn’t seeing how this is relating to their current conversation topic, but she lets Abe continue anyway.

“When he was asked about it, he said ‘I didn’t fail. I figured out 2,000 ways how not to make a light bulb’. He needed only one way to make it work.” Abe takes the book from Anna’s hands and flips to a different section before turning it back to her. “The Preservation Room. Go ahead, take a look. 

“Do you know what the Preservation Room is for?” Anna shakes her head and continues to browse the page. She can vaguely see where Abe is going with this now, and it makes her slightly uneasy. “It’s where they clean, repair, and maintain all the documents in the storage housings when they’re not on display or in the vault. Now, when the case needs work they take it out of the vault, directly across the hall, and into the Preservation Room. The best time for us, or Arnold, to steal it would be during the gala this weekend when the guards are distracted by the VIPs upstairs. However, we'll make our way to the Preservation Room, where there's much less security.” 

Anna stares at Abe, having abandoned the text as soon as he brought up the gala this weekend. “Well if Arnold…” she trails off and glances back down at the page. “Hmm… Preservation… gala… this might… this might work?” Anna looks back up at Abe with a slight smile on her face now. “This could be possible.”

\----

“Okay, so you’ll set up shop behind the Archives in the van.” Abe and Anna are sitting in Abe’s dining room, creating a work environment to safely work on the Declaration once they get it into their care. They’ve gone over how Abe’s going to secure the document once he has it, but they’re still working on how he’ll get down into the Preservation room.

Anna nods and draws on a small piece of paper that she’s laid out everything on. “Yep. I can access the cable to their security feeds down in the Metro behind the building. I’ll tap into their feed, which will give me eyes from the van where I will be waiting for you as patiently as I can. It should be no problem to get down in there.”

They come up with an ingenious way to get access down into the lower levels by using Robert’s fingerprints without him even knowing. Abe fishes out Washington’s 1789 inaugural campaign button from his own collection, and coats it in a solution that will be able to be picked up with an ultraviolet light. He’ll send it to him before the gala, and when he ‘accidentally’ bumps into him at the party, he’ll get his fingerprints from a champagne flute. It’s nearly foolproof.

Anna’s already played with a high powered laser she had from a previous experiment gone wrong that will do the job of increasing the temperature of the Declaration sensors high enough for the document to be taken down. The plan is actually coming together.

A few photo scouts and fake ids later, Abe’s ready for the gala on Saturday. Honestly, he’s feeling pretty damn good about it all.

\----

He ‘runs into’ Robert rather quickly once he gets inside under the guise of a repairman. Robert’s strolling around the room not talking to anyone, so Abe goes up for more reasons than just to get his fingerprints. “Dr. Townsend,” Abe says warmly.

“Mr. Brown, what a surprise to see you here.”

“Well, I made a very large donation last minute.” Robert nods his head in thanks. “You look very nice and put together.” And Abe isn’t lying, even though he’s only wearing a standard black tux with a black bowtie, his hair carefully coiffed.

“Well thank you very much. By the way, thank you for that button that you sent me. It’s greatly appreciated.” Abe nods as if it’s no big deal.

Before Abe can say anything else though, another man walks up behind Robert, interested in the conversation they’re having. 

“Robert? Who is this?” The man looks a few years older than Robert, though with more gray in his hair.

Robert’s smile nearly disappears off of his face when the other man talks. “Oh Mr. Rivington, this is Paul Brown. Paul Brown, Mr. Rivington.”

Rivington’s holding an extra champagne flute, and Abe suddenly feels awkward and out of place. “You know what? Let me take this,” Abe says, reaching for the bottom of Robert’s glass where he hadn’t touched it yet. “So you can take that.” Robert lets out a single syllable of what sounds like laughter before he schools his expression.

“Thank you very much, Mr. Brown.”

“Alright, Romeo. You’ve got what you need, now get out of there.” Anna hisses in his ear. The noise only startles Abe a bit, having forgotten she could hear everything he did.

Abe holds his glass up in a gesture of cheers, Robert and Rivington following suit. “To committing high treason!” Rivington looks at him with utter concern, Robert with an expression full of mirth. “Because that’s what these men were doing when they signed the Declaration. Had they lost the war, they would have been imprisoned, tried, and drawn and quartered…” The conversation dies momentarily until Abe brings it back in one finite resolution. “So, here’s to the men who did what was considered wrong in order to do what they knew was right.”

Rivington and Robert both reluctantly hold up their glasses after Abe’s boisterous toast. Abe throws his entire flute down his throat while the other two only sip at their own drinks. He thinks he may have gone just a tad too far. “Well, goodnight.”

Turning away as quickly as he can, he walks off toward the bathrooms and hands off his empty flute to a waiter as he goes. Abe throws the drink from Robert’s flute into a water fountain, and steps into the bathroom. Checking the stalls to make sure they’re empty, he begins the process to salvage Robert’s fingerprints off of the glass.

The rest of the plan goes relatively well. Abe gets a successful print and makes it down to the security level relatively quickly. No one has come looking for him as of yet, Anna’s still got eyes on the security cameras, and the two of them both figured out Robert’s password to go even deeper (it’s ‘Valley forge’). It’s pretty much smooth sailing until Anna loses her feed in the Preservation Room.

Her voice goes from calm in Abe’s ear to panicked as she realizes she has no eyes on any camera. “Abe, I can’t see anything. You need to get out of there now. Take the entire thing if you’re not finished unscrewing the case. I don’t care.”

Abe grunts in acknowledgment, and lifts the case out the door and in the direction of the elevator. He’s already doubled back down to continue unscrewing it when the maintenance door at the end of the hallway bursts open.

It’s Abe and Anna’s worst nightmare. At the end of the hallway stands Arnold and his group of men, hard hats on and everything with weapons in their hands. Abe knows it can only have been them that cut off Anna’s video feed. 

Without telling Anna what’s happening, Abe jams the elevator button to close the door as the men pull out their guns and begin firing at Abe. He ducks down behind the Declaration in its bullet proof case, but he’s going to need the elevator doors to close quicker. Eventually they do.

Sitting in the elevator unscrewing the final screws on the Declaration’s case, he’s honestly amazed that Arnold and his men got so far below the party to where the Declaration was supposed to be. Arnold and his men planned this attack as thoroughly as Abe and Anna, albeit a little bit more violent.

Anna speaks in his ear quickly as Abe makes quick work of extracting the Declaration from its case, and rolling it up to fit in a smaller document tube. He has a pretty solid belief that Arnold won’t follow him directly up into the party, but he figures he should probably get to Anna and the van as quickly as possible.

Stowing the document as far back into his jacket as he can, Abe straightens his bow tie and pats his sweaty hands dry on his pant leg. The elevator doors open back up into the outskirts of the party, and Abe makes quick work skirting the edge and towards the exit through the gift shop. He’s almost made it through when a small woman at the counter yells at him for attempting to steal one of the replica documents.

After grudgingly using his credit card to make the purchase, Abe rushes out of the back building entrance he went into earlier to where his and Anna’s unsuspecting van awaits. Anna’s chattering nervously in his ear and Abe has to tell her to stop or he’s going to go insane from the stress.

“Uh… Abe?” She speaks up when he’s halfway to the van. Freedom is nearly in sight, but Anna’s voice doesn’t sound very reassuring. “The uh, the mildly attractive mean Declaration man is behind you.” 

Abe throws one of the back doors to the van open and shoves the real Declaration inside, turning around in time to see Robert almost run straight into him. “Mr. Townsend, nice to see you again.” 

“Mr. Brown… what is that you have in your hand?” Abe looks down to where Robert is gesturing and sighs minutely. Anna tells him rather sternly to get into the van. 

Abe shrugs. “Just a souvenir. A token to remember my time here at this--” Before Abe finishes speaking, an angry sounding alarm begins blaring from inside the building. Robert’s eyes go incredibly wide, and Anna practically screeches at him in his ear. Abe curses Benedict Arnold. They would have already been gone by now if it weren’t for Arnold’s sloppiness. They should be in the clear. 

Instead, he stands there for a minute longer in front of Robert. “You didn’t,” he breathes. Abe weakly shakes his head to no avail. Lunging for the parcel in Abe’s hand, Abe catches Robert’s wrist and tries to keep the man from grabbing the document. “Security!” Robert shouts to the officers beginning to come outside. 

“Give me this!” he yells at Abe, and yanks the parcel from Abe’s hands.

Abe lets him take it in a moment of exasperation and backs away slowly as Robert clutches the document to his chest. “Fine, take it, it’s yours.”

Hardly ten seconds pass before a large food truck swing around the corner and speeds up towards Robert, who’s currently halfway back to the sidewalk with the Declaration clutched to his chest.

Abe watches helplessly as the van slows and flings one of the back doors open to reveal an all blacked out Bradford, smiling as he grabs Robert around the waist and hauls him into the van.

Abe’s yelling at Anna to start the van as he flings the other back door back open, clambering inside as fast as he can. “Follow that van!” Abe gasps out, climbing over Anna’s tech equipment littered throughout the back. He settles himself into the passenger’s seat; Anna still hasn’t put the van into gear, and Bradford and Arnold are getting further away.

“Wait—what? We’re going _after_ Arnold and his guns? That isn’t going to play out very well for us, Abe.”

“We can’t let Arnold get his hands on the Declaration. We have to catch up with them. Now drive!” As if on cue, a swarm of police officers and security guards swarm the back entrance of the National Archives, making Anna’s mind up for her.

Arnold’s van is quickly disappearing into the throngs of traffic, but Anna finds it and gains on their ex-coworkers fairly fast. 

Arnold sees them pull up next to their van and unleashes a round of gun fire towards Anna and Abe’s van. The driver’s window breaks, but the two are unharmed as Anna swerves to avoid any more shots.

Narrowly avoiding a car to their left, Anna swings the van behind Arnold’s truck. Abe watches in horror as the back door swings open widely with Robert hanging on for dear life, the Declaration clutched tightly to his chest.

“Pull up close to him, I’ll open the side door and get him in here,” Abe suggests frantically. Anna nods and switches back to the lane on her right. Bradford, clued into Anna’s maneuvering, starts trying to fire at the van again when Abe opens the side door.

Robert turns his head vainly to see what’s happening when Abe begins to yell at him. “Robert! You’ve got to jump! We’ve got you!” Bradford fires a few more shots, Anna swerving to avoid them once more. Abe’s nearly flung from the vehicle in the process, caught in the middle of swerving while halfway hanging out to reach for Robert.

“Am I supposed to trust you now?” Robert yells above the wind and the sirens of oncoming police vehicles. “I’m not letting go of this document!”

“Just take my hand!”

Abe’s yelling is to no avail when Arnold swings the truck around a corner, Robert swinging away from Abe and Anna, and back towards Bradford at the rear. When he finally comes back into view, Abe notices Robert doesn’t have the document, but says nothing to Anna.

“Anna, get me closer!” Despite two more shots being fired off, Anna gets close enough for Abe to yell at Robert to jump. When he does jump, Robert slams into Abe, the latter’s head hitting the metal floor of the van with a hard thud. Anna looks over to her left and sees Bradford smile at them before their van turns down a separate road. In the back of the van, Robert climbs off of Abe with little regard for the other man’s health.

“We have to chase them! They’ve got the Declaration,” Robert spits out hurriedly. His carefully coiffed hair has fallen out of its place, and Robert looks shaken but together.

“They have what?” Anna tries not to screech from the front seat. She’s still driving and trying to stay on the road while Abe and Robert are crouched in the back.

Abe sighs, but pays no mind to Anna and Robert’s frenzied thoughts. “Are you okay?” He means to direct the question to Robert, but Anna takes it instead. 

“Oh yeah, fine. I just got shot at and nearly run off the road, but I’m sure I’ll be okay. Thanks for asking.”

Rolling his eyes, Abe directs the question again to Robert, who’s trying to interrupt again to yell at Abe. “Robert, are you okay?”

Robert looks taken aback slightly at the question. As if Abe had no business asking him about his wellbeing after more or less kidnapping him. He seems to check himself over for any broken bones, and upon finding none, he nods.

“Mr. Brown, what about the Declaration? Those men took it! They’re probably halfway to their safe house by now!” 

 Abe shakes his head and holds up a finger. “One, my name isn’t actually Paul Brown; it’s Abraham Woodhull—but call me Abe. Hers is Anna Strong.” Robert’s eyes go wide as he mutters obscenities under his breath. “And two, they don’t actually have the real Declaration.” Abe takes a thinly wrapped parchment from the shelf behind him to show Robert. It’s in a thick travel case, and he unscrews it to show Robert that it’s alright.

“It’ a fake. Bought it from the gift shop on my way out. Arnold and them have a fake one. I thought it might be a good idea to have two, and turns out I was right.” He slides the document back onto the shelf as Robert tries to grab for it.

Robert looks aghast. “You were going to let me walk back in there with a fake document?”

Abe shakes his head. “That was never the plan. We--.”

“Wait,” Anna interrupts. “Please tell me you used cash. Please tell me this isn’t going to come back to us.” She chances a glance in the rearview mirror at Abe, who says nothing. “Are you kidding me?! They’ll know everything about you _and_ me!” She’s practically seething.

“I had no cash!” Abe defends. “By the way,” he says, looking over at Robert. “You owe me thirty-five dollars, plus tax.”

The van falls silent for a moment while Anna makes a left turn at a green arrow. Abe thinks how nice the quiet sounds after their whole ordeal, but he has his hopes dashed five seconds later as Robert loudly speaks up again.

“Who were those men? They would have killed me had they had the chance.”

“ _Those_ are the men we warned you would steal the Declaration. We did the only thing we could do.” Abe leans back on his hands and throws a pointed look in Robert’s direction.

In a move that Abe probably should have seen coming, Robert tries vainly to lunge for the document perched on the shelf behind him. Abe jerks up and catches Robert’s wrist in his grip. 

“Give me that!” Robert yells.

Abe groans and releases Robert’s wrist. “Please stop yelling. It’s giving me a migraine.” Robert actually lapses into silence and sits further away from Abe. 

“Anna, will you get us somewhere we can get out of this van and talk?” Abe asks, desperation lacing his voice.

Anna gives a short laugh and turns right, away from heavy traffic.

\----

Agent John Andre gets to the National Archives gala as fast as his car and D.C. traffic will take him. He meets with the security officers outside the building where they quickly set up a perimeter. Nobody in, nobody out. Officers and other FBI agents are still arriving when he walks inside the building to survey the damage. He doesn’t get to see much before he’s making a speech to the frightened party goers.

“Ladies and gentleman, my name is John Andre. I'm the agent in charge. I want to reassure you; you are not in danger in any way. If we all cooperate, we'll get through this with as little frustration as possible. Thank you.” The speech is quick and short, just enough information to possibly persuade people to come forward if they know or saw anything suspicious.

He looks around at his agents surrounding him and tells everyone he wants positive photo ids of everyone at the party. If they resist, get a search warrat. Everyone nods unanimously, save for a shorter curly brown haired agent clutching his phone in his hand. “Yes, Agent Brewster, what can I help you with?”

“Uh sir, we actually got a tip a few days ago that someone was going to steal the Declaration of Independence.” The words send Andre fuming. As odd as a tip like that would sound to the FBI, considering their location, it’s one that should not have been overlooked so quickly.

“Do we have a name for the tipster?”

Brewster’s face reddens and he casts his eyes downward. “There was no file opened. We didn’t find the information credible.”

Andre just stares at Brewster for several moments of awe. “How about now?”

\----

The head security guard takes Andre below deck into the hallway where the Preservation room is located. The small area is bustling with people trying to figure out what the hell happened, and frankly, it’s a little overwhelming. He meets with a Mr. James Rivington who tells him there’s a copy of the Declaration on display currently still. 

Andre tells him to leave it for the sake of the guests’ knowledge. “They know something happened, they don’t know what though.” 

Agent Benjamin Tallmadge walks up to him as he’s talking to Rivington to tell him that police have found bullet casings in and around the elevator. Weaving his way between all the bodies in the hallway, Andre kneels to where there’s bullet casings, along with the case of the Declaration. There’s three bullet holes that paint an even more interesting story.

“So… who was firing, and who were they firing at? Why weren’t they getting along?”

\----

The park Anna, Abe, and Robert pulled over to is quiet enough that Abe is finally able to think peacefully for more than ten seconds without Anna or Robert interrupting.

Abe tries to grasp the night’s events and put them into some semblance of order. Really though, that might be too much to ask for at this point. Never, in any of his plans, did he account for Arnold showing up, and Anna and him having to kidnap Robert. 

They can’t take the Declaration back to Abe’s place now because the FBI will have his name by now from his credit card. On the other hand, though, they really need to see the copies of the Silence Dogood letters that will get them one step closer to finding the hidden treasure. 

Abe’s pacing outside of the car, Anna’s leaned out of the passenger side window, and Robert is sitting with the sliding door open. He’s taken off his suit jacket and untied his bowtie in exasperation after failing to get any clear answers.

“You know what we have to do, Abe,” Anna says, breaking his silence. “We need to get those letters.”

The apparent talk of letters piques Robert’s interest. “Letters? What letters?” 

Abe looks to Robert with mild disdain. As if Robert’s voice continues to feed an ever growing headache. “The Silence Dogood letters. We need them.”

“ _You_ have the original Silence Dogood letters?”

Abe hums in assent, but it’s clearly not enough for Robert. “How did you get those; did you steal them too?”

He’s close to losing it. “ _No,_ they’re scans. Please be quiet now.” Abe continues to pace and shoves his hands into his pant pockets.

“How did you get scans? Even I don’t have personal scans." 

Abe groans and turns to look at Robert. “ _Jesus_ man. I know the person who has the letters. They got me the scans. Now please,” he clasps his hands as if in prayer and looks at Robert dead in the eye. “Be. Quiet.”

The silence lasts for exactly fifteen seconds. Anna’s about to speak up when Robert opens his mouth instead. Again.

“ _Why_ do you need them?”

“You sure do ask a lot of questions, don’t you?” Abe pulls the Declaration’s tube off his shoulder and walks over to Robert sitting in the van.

“I’ll tell you what. If you’ll sit there quietly and not talk anymore, I’ll let you hold the Declaration. Sound good?” Anna looks at him like he’s crazy, and Abe knows he probably is. Robert could run off with the tube into the hands of the FBI, or even Arnold and his team. Abe pushes his gut feeling aside and gives the tube to the waiting hands of Robert Townsend. Abe tries not to notice how pleased he looks.

Anna sighs and tucks a strand of hair behind her ear. “Abe, I’ll say this again since you apparently didn’t hear me the first time. You know where we need to go. We probably have our own satellite by now. The government doesn’t take kindly to people stealing precious documents.”

“I know, but I just thought I could do this without having to tell my dad. He’s not going to be very proud of me.”

Anna goes to nod and say more, but Robert chooses that exact moment to jump to his feet and try to make a break for it with the document clutched close. Anna shouts Abe’s name, and he chases after Robert for a few feet until he’s able to snag a finger through Robert’s belt loop. He’s smaller than Robert, but Abe yanks hard enough that Robert still falls to the ground unceremoniously, document gripped like a vice in his arms.

“Get _off_ of me!” He yells in vain as Abe struggles to his feet. As Robert struggles to his feet as well, Abe yanks the tube away and slings the strap over his shoulder. Robert looks affronted.

“Fine. You want to leave? You’re free. Go.”

Robert crosses his arms over his chest and steps closer to Abe, clearly trying to intimidate the smaller man. “I’m not leaving. Not without the Declaration.”

“Well you’re not leaving _with_ the Declaration either.” The two stare at each other for a few moments, Abe unconsciously standing on his tip toes to be eye level with the taller man.

“I’m not letting it out of my sight, so I guess I’m going with you.”

Abe looks slightly taken aback by Robert’s statement enough for Robert to reach out and try to grab the strap of the Declaration. “No no no. You’re not coming with us.”

Robert smiles and stands impossibly closer to Abe, their noses almost touching. “Well then you shouldn’t have told me where you were going.” Abe can hear Anna groan in the background, but Abe’s still focused on this smirking man who looks like the cat that ate the canary, eyes blazing with a competitive fire.

Abe determines that Robert is going to ruin his life.

\----

Robert doesn’t know what to expect when they arrive at Abe’s father’s house. It’s an older colonial looking townhouse with white siding and green window shutters. Robert thinks their red van will stick out like a sore thumb against the white townhouse, but he finds solace in the fact that should they be caught, he’s still considered a kidnapping victim at this point.

Running a hand through his now disheveled hair, Robert heaves himself out of the van when Abe hops out of the passenger seat and opens the van door.

“Let’s go, Mr. Townsend. You are the lucky winner of a meeting with Richard Woodhull, my father.”

Anna whines from the driver’s side as she joins Abe and Robert. “Is this what walking to my death feels like?”

Abe rolls his eyes and pats her on the shoulder. “You’ll be fine. It’s me that he’s going to rip apart.” Robert finds it hard to believe that Abe’s father is going to be as harsh as Anna and Abe are making him out to be.

He’s wrong.

When Richard Woodhull opens the front door to Abe, Anna, and Robert, the first thing out of his mouth is to ask Abe if he finally got Anna pregnant. Robert scoffs in disbelief and watches Abe’s face heat up. It’s oddly endearing.

“Nice to see you too, Dad.” Abe pushes past his father, ushering for Anna and Robert to follow. Robert nods politely to Richard when he passes. Richard’s eyes squint slightly more as he passes into the living room.

The room is homely and looks adequately lived in, if only by Abe’s dad. He follows Anna’s lead and sits down on one side of the loveseat next to her.

Richard follows Abe into the room and stands defensively near the fireplace. The place reeks of history, and Robert wants to explore and ask questions.

“What is this about if she’s not pregnant, Abraham?”

“Come on, Dad. Have some confidence in me.” Richard stares at Abe as he tries to act offended. Robert wants to laugh. “Alright then, straight to the point. We need the Silence Dogood letters. It’s about the Freemason treasure.”

Richard’s eyes widen and he takes a step towards Abe in disbelief. “You found ‘Charlotte’?” Robert’s confused for a second before he remembers the ship with the pipe on it that they found down in Antarctica that they told him about. It registers to Robert for the first time that this treasure hunt really is an entire Woodhull ordeal.

Abe nods. “We did. She’s a ship, and she’s beautiful, dad; you should see her.”

The two lapse into silence and Robert takes the moment to interrupt. “Your _dad_ has the letters?”

Nodding Richard uncrosses his arms and shoves his hands in his pant pockets instead. “Used to. I don’t have them anymore.”

Abe’s blank look says it all. “You don’t have them anymore?”

“No, I donated them to the Franklin Institute. I figured they’d be of more use to them then to me. Wait,” Richard seems to think. “You need the letters for the treasure? I thought Charlotte was the treasure.”

“No, Charlotte was another clue. We got one step closer with her.”

Richard scoffs and Abe frowns from his stance near the loveseat where Robert and Anna are sat. “That’s how this thing goes. One clue leads to one more clue, which leads to another. I wasted thirty years on that treasure. It’s a myth.” He sounds resigned, and Robert feels for him. 

The next remarks are pointed towards Robert and Anna. “And you two. Abraham dragged you into this ridiculous treasure hunt along with him now too?”

“Quite literally,” Robert deadpans.

“I volunteered,” Anna says happier than Robert.

Richard ‘hmpfs’ and goes into the kitchen. “Get out of it while you can.” Anna looks slightly offended.

Abe waits until he comes back in with a glass of water. “How can you just assume it’s a myth. I refuse to believe that. There have been too many clues for it to not be real. We’re getting close now Dad, I can feel it.”

“You disappoint me,” Richard mutters, and walks out of the room with his book under his arm.

Robert looks up from his seat at Abe. “Your dad’s right, Abe. We don’t even know if there is another clue.”

Abe looks down at Robert, and then slings the Declaration off his shoulder. “I can think of a way we can find out. We can find out right now.”

In the end, it takes a fair bit of convincing Robert to let them take the Declaration out and rub it with lemon juice. It takes Abe letting Robert work on it and swearing on his life that if anything happened to it, he’d turn himself in with Robert as a captive. Still uneasy about the whole process, Robert reluctantly agrees.

The division of labor to collect the necessary items is simple. Abe divides tasks to Anna and Robert to find q-tips, salt, pepper, gloves, baking soda, lemons, and four glasses. They lay a trash bag over the table to protect from germs, but Robert still cringes outwardly _and_ inwardly at what they’re about to do. 

Abe hands Robert a q-tip, and he rubs it against the lemon gently before picking a spot in the top right hand corner to begin. The moment is anticlimactic. With all the blathering on about invisible maps that Abe had talked about, nothing shows up with the lemon juice.

Richard pops his head around the corner and clears his throat before speaking. “How old is it?”

“About 200 years,” Abe replies absentmindedly.

Nodding, Richard walks up the stairs, presumably to his room. “Well Ferrous Sulphate inks can only be brought out with heat, so maybe throw it in the oven or something.” Robert moans at the thought of throwing the Declaration of Independence into the oven.

Thinking quickly, Robert lowers his head to breathe onto the lemon juice soaked spot, but unfortunately, Abe decides to do the same thing at the same exact time. The two bumps heads, Robert pulling back fast as he holds a hand to his left eye. “Seriously?”

Despite the head bump, the heat works. A Freemason compass appears in the right corner, and Robert knows Abe feels validated right about now. Robert’s spirits rise.

“Well gentlemen,” Anna exclaims excitedly. “It looks like we need more heat and juice. Who wants to get it?” Abe grins and runs upstairs to where there’s undoubtedly a spare hair dryer, and Robert goes back to the fridge to get two more lemons.

The rest of the night passes quickly. Anna helps squeeze the lemons, Robert adds the heat, and Abe records the sequences of numbers that appear one after the other. There’s about thirty sets of numbers that definitely are not the map that Abe said would be on the back.

“What do these numbers mean? Are they latitudes and longitudes? This isn’t a map,” Anna supplies sitting back in a dining room chair now that her job is done.

“No,” Robert mutters to himself, thinking. “They’re a part of a sequence. An…Ottendorf Cipher, I believe.”

“That’s right,” Richard speaks up. Robert startles, not having seen Richard come back down the stairs.

“An Ottendorf Cipher?” Anna asks, confused.

Abe looks down at his list of numbers to make sure he completely understands what he’s looking at. “Each of these three numbers corresponds to a word in a key. Usually a random book or a newspaper article. In this case, the Silence Dogood letters. So it's like the page number of the key text, the line on the page, and the letter in that line. That’s why we need the letters. But unfortunately, my brilliant dad doesn’t have them.”

“Hey, I donated them because I thought others could benefit. Don’t turn this on me.”

Robert’s lost in his own world as he contemplates the bombshell laid out in front of him. “Wow,” he mutters. He pulls his gloves off and lays them down gently on the table. “All this time and we never knew what was on the back…”

“On the back of what?” Richard asks.

They all look up as Richard makes a move for the document and lifts it up to reveal the first few lines of the Declaration. Robert and Abe scream for him to stop, but it’s too late now. The damage is done. Anna drops her head into her hands. Richard splutters and backs up a few steps, while Robert takes the document back from him and lays it gently down on the table again.

“I can’t believe… that’s the… Declaration...”

“Yes, and it’s very fragile,” Robert says slowly.

“Dad,” Abe interrupts, throwing his suit jacket back on. “I’d like to explain to you why I had to do this, but now is not the time. We need to get to Philadelphia and to the Silence Dogood letters. Can we borrow your car?”

Richard nods slowly, eyes still glued to the document in front of him that’s being rolled up by Robert’s careful hands. “And if the police come asking questions?”

Abe shrugs his shoulders and looks to Anna and Robert. “We can tie you up if you want.”


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Almost finished. This chapter took way too much on time on Google Maps with figuring out where Anna and Rob would have run in the movie. In short, movie geography fucking sucks, and IMDB's error page for National Treasure helps tons (even if it's highly unlikely that Anna and Rob would have run to Reading Terminal Market from Ranstead street. Oh well).
> 
> I still don't have a beta, so all mistakes are my own. My apologies.
> 
> Enjoy, and let me know what you think.

“His name is Abraham Woodhull,” Ben Tallmadge says, pointing at the security footage of Abe checking out at the gift shop. “Dr. Rivington said Dr. Townsend introduced him as Mr. Paul Brown, but that name wasn’t on the guest list. The gift store clerk said he seemed… nervous. He tried to steal a copy of the Declaration and then pay with cash when she caught him. Eventually he used his Visa.”

Andre looks at the grainy photo of the small man named Abraham and chuckles inwardly. He loved when criminals made simple mistakes. 

\----

They take Richard’s old Cadillac that’s sitting in the garage. Abe hates that he’s had to steal from his dad, but ultimately he realizes he had no choice. At this point, it’s either keep running to find the treasure before the FBI catches up, or go to jail without finding the mythical treasure. Both options make Abe sick to his stomach.

The car is nearly to Philadelphia when Abe reveals that he stole his father’s copy of _Common Sense_ because he always hides a few hundred dollars within its pages. Richard Woodhull does not fail them.

When Abe pulls the car into a parking spot on a side street in front of a café, Robert is asleep in the back seat, morning light spilling into the car and onto his hair and face. Abe finds that he’d like to stay and wait for the full effect of the rising sun, but he knows they need to move fast; the FBI is probably gaining on them with every passing hour. Reaching to turn the car off, he catches sight of Anna watching him with a keen, knowing eye. She winks, but doesn’t say anything.

Anna ends up waking up Robert, because Abe takes too long, and they need to move. Abe and Robert leave as much of their formal attire as they can in the car so as to draw less attention to themselves.

A few blocks over is a small nameless department store that Anna figures won’t necessarily know what’s happened in D.C. yet, so they try their luck.

Robert and Abe are mostly silent as they pick out their clothes. Anna left them about forty-five minutes ago to try and figure out the cipher down at the Franklin Institute. She insisted that they two of them would be spotted too quickly to offer any worthy service. Abe grudgingly sent her on her way after that.

“So were you and your dad always this close?” Robert asks once they’re in the dressing rooms. He’s situated in the room next to Abe’s.

Abe scoffs at the clear attempt at humor. He didn’t know Robert was capable of that. “We used to be closer. When he gave up hunting for the treasure and I began to, he pulled away. My mom left, my brother died, it was a shit show for a few years. He wanted me to marry my brother’s fiancé.”

“And why didn’t you?”

Abe lets loose a single laugh. There’s no way that Robert is serious. “One, it’s the twenty-first century. You marry who you want, not some prearranged shit. Two, I was in a relationship with a guy from my law class back at Columbia then.”

Robert’s silent for a minute, seemingly taking it all in. “And your dad… why would he have asked you to give up a relationship you were happy in for a relationship you wouldn’t have been?”

Abe wonders if Robert’s having a hard time wrapping his mind around the concept because his father was never like that with him. Perhaps Robert grew up in a home where his parents validated the way their son felt about people.

“My dad never recognized my relationships with guys—only girls. It’s why he only asked about Anna and not you at the house. Sorry about that, by the way.”

“Well that’s really shitty. My dad did his own things with religion that annoyed me, but I can say he and my mother always respected and acknowledged the fact that I wasn’t straight.” Pushing the door to the changing room open, he leans against it and watches Abe open his own door. Abe’s intrigued by how this conversation has progressed.

“’Not straight’… you’re gay?” Abe quotes, staring up at Robert. His hair finally got some much needed attention from a comb, and he looks put together once more like the day Abe first met him—almost.

Robert chuckles to himself and looks down at his hands. “Isn’t that the question of the century.” He walks out of the dressing room ahead of Abe and towards the front of the store. Yep, Robert is definitely ruining Abe’s life.

Anna comes running into the department store as Abe’s paying for the two of them with his father’s money. She’s got a large smile on her face, and the yellow notepad with the cipher clutched in her hands.

“Did you get it?” Robert asks as Anna spots the two of them.

“Oh, did I find it,” she exclaims as the money leaves Abe’s hands. “’The vision to see the treasured past comes as the timely shadow crosses in front of the house of Pass and Stow’. Now, ‘Pass and Stow’, of course,” Anna chuckles as if it’s obvious. “Referring to--.”

“The Liberty Bell,” Robert interrupts.

Anna looks positively affronted at Robert taking away her thunder. “Why do you have to do that?”

Robert looks at her and continues speaking. “Well John Pass and John Stow cast the bell.”

“Okay… Well then what does the rest of it mean?”

Abe steps away from the counter and begins pacing, the Declaration clutched in his hand as he thinks out the new riddle. “Okay, so ‘The vision to see the treasured past’ must refer to a way to read the map.”

“I thought the cipher was a way to read the map.” Anna’s trying to wrap her head around the entire thing, but the more riddle this treasure hunt builds on, the harder it’s getting.

“No, the cipher was a way to find a way to read the map.” Abe supplies, somewhat unhelpfully.

Robert snaps his fingers as he pieces together everything in his mind. “And the way to read the map can be found where the ‘timely shadow’ crosses in front of the Liberty Bell.” He’s walking closer to Abe unconsciously while he thinks, Abe inadvertently doing the same.

“Crosses in front of the ‘house’ of the Liberty Bell. Independence Hall.” Robert is nodding along, the two practically completing each other’s thoughts by this point. Anna looks on in half amusement, half annoyance at not being able to be included.

“Right, so ‘timely shadow’—it’s a specific time.”

“Right…” Abe whispers, barely loud enough for Anna to hear. A clever smile creeps across his face.

Anna chooses then to interrupt, an easy opening that none of them probably know off the top of their heads. “Uh... what time?”

Robert and Abe jump apart slightly, unaware of how close they had gotten in the past minute or so. “Time... time…” Abe thinks for a minute and then puts a hand on Robert’s shoulder, pulling his attention even further to him. “You’re gonna love this.”

Walking over to the counter, Abe tries to get the cashier’s attention. “Excuse me.” She looks up from her phone with a bored expression on her face, and walks over to where Abe’s standing. “Can I borrow one of those hundreds I just paid you with?”

The look on her face says it all. “No?” Anna rolls her eyes at Abe.

Abe sighs and looks between himself, Anna, and Robert for ideas. Robert glances down at Abe’s watch, and Abe catches on quickly. “What if I gave you this diving watch for collateral? It’s white-gold. Very valuable.”

The girl glances down as Abe offers it up, and sighs. “Whatever.” She opens the cash register and hands him one of the $100 bills he just paid with.

Taking the money, Abe begins rattling off from memory. “On the back of a hundred-dollar bill is an etching of Independence Hall based on a painting done in 1784. The artist was actually a friend of Benjamin Franklin’s. It’s actually quite fascinating.” He shrugs off the Declaration from his shoulder and turns to give it to Robert, but hesitates and gives him a look. “You aren’t going to run off again, are you?”

Robert smiles and shakes his head. “Not a chance.” Abe smiles back and proceeds to hand the Declaration to Robert.

“If we look at the clock tower, we may find a specific time…” Picking up a water bottle from the counter, Abe holds it up to the back of the bill to magnify the clock face. He shows the bill to both Robert and Anna as he continues to bask in the sheer wonder of it all. “2:22.”

“What time is it now?” Robert asks hopefully.

The cashier looks down at Abe’s watch in her hand. “Almost 3:00.”

Abe and Robert sigh in disappointment as Abe hands back the money and gets his watch back.

“Wait... why are you guys sad? We didn’t miss it,” Anna says. Abe looks over to her and notices a lack of defeat on her face. “Don’t you… oh my God. I know something about history you don’t?”

“We’d be real interested to learn about it, Anna.”

The smile doesn’t disappear as Anna tells them. “Hold on, I think I want to just bask in this moment for a minute. Is this what you feel like all the time? It’s wonderful. It’s--.”

“Anna!” Robert says, exasperated.

Anna refocuses her attention and clears her throat. “What I know, is that Daylight Savings time wasn’t introduced until World War I. _That_ means, that if it’s almost three o’clock now, it was only two o’clock in 1776.”

Robert and Abe’s spirits visually lift as Anna finishes telling her information. “Anna Strong, you’re a genius!” Abe exclaims. Robert, not wanting to waste any more time as the FBI continues to pursue them, pats Abe on the shoulder and starts to walk towards the exit.

“Right, let’s go then!”

\----

They end up on the three o’clock tour of Independence Hall in an effort to get up to the bell tower where they’ll be able to see the next clue. Abe breaks away from the group first, Robert and Anna in close pursuit behind him. Sneaking under a velvet rope meant to serve as a deterrent to the public, the three begin to climb the stairs up to the former home of the Liberty Bell.

Opening the door to the bell chamber of Independence Hall, and climbing out into the slight wind is something Anna never thought she’d be doing in this life, or the next. She remembers reading in a textbook at one point that the current bell was called the Centennial Bell after replacing the Liberty Bell in 1876. What her high school history teacher would think of her now.

They’ve only minutes to spare before 3:22, so Anna takes a moment to take in the view. She can look west and see the Independence Mall, or east and see Independence National Park with the Liberty Bell.

When 3:22 does come, they watch as the sun casts a shadow behind the bell tower, and points to a specific section of the brick down below. That must be where the next clue is hiding.

“Alright, I’ll go down and get that, you guys go back downstairs. I’ll meet you in the signing room.” Robert and Anna both nod as Abe goes back down the ladder first.

Taking one more look at the spot under the cast shadow, Anna smiles to herself. “3:22… my idea.”

The trip down is relatively uneventful. They avoid the tour they were originally on, and join back up at the tail end. The tour ends in the signing room, so Robert and Anna walk around looking at all of the artifacts like every other tourist. She doesn’t have much to say to Robert, maybe a ‘thank you’ for not running after Abe started to trust him more. Anna doesn’t say anything though.

As the last people are leaving the signing room, Abe sneaks in. Anna can see something in his pocket and knows this must be the next clue. “What’d you find?”

Abe takes his find out of his jacket and holds them out gingerly for Robert and Anna to see. “Some kind of ocular device. A device to maybe ‘see the treasured past’?” Anna thinks they look like old glasses with three layers of lenses, a clear layer, a blue layer, and a red layer. There’s levers on each side of the layers to presumably move and change what lenses to look out of. She thinks that she’s most likely looking at a pair of two-hundred-year-old glasses.

“I think Benjamin Franklin invented something like these,” Robert says quietly, taking them into his hands.

Abe takes the Declaration from him and slides the document out of its tube. “Uh… I think he invented these.” The thought takes Anna’s breath away.

Robert gives the glasses to Anna as he helps Abe unroll the document as carefully as they can. When they’ve fully unrolled it, Abe lets out an awed breath.

Anna looks around for trouble. “What?"

“It’s just, the last time this was in here, it was being signed.”

“Abe, there’s another tour coming.”

“Right, flip it over.”

Anna gives Abe the glasses when he asks for them, and she can only imagine what he sees when he puts them on. He gasps slightly. “What, what do you see? Is it a treasure map?”

Abe hums to himself and takes off the glasses. “It says ‘Heere at the Wall’. ‘Heere’ spelled with two e’s. Here, take a look.” He holds out the glasses to Robert and Anna, but Robert snatches them up first.

“Why can’t they just say treasure. Go to this place and spend it wisely?” Robert laughs lightly at Anna’s exasperated joke.

Anna’s about to get the glasses to look for herself when Abe makes an actual sound of panic. With Abe still holding the Declaration, Anna runs over to window looking out at Independence Mall and curses to herself. “It’s Arnold. How did they even find us?”

“Because Arnold has unlimited resources… and he’s smart.” Anna turns around to see Abe and Robert rolling up the Declaration as quick as they can. “Look, we’re not getting out of here without them seeing us, so it looks like we’re splitting up. We don’t want them to have either of these, but we _especially_ don’t want them to have both of them together. Anna and Robert, you guys take the Declaration. I’ll take the glasses and the empty outer tube. Meet me at the car and call me if there’s a problem.”

“Oh, you mean like if we get caught and killed?” Anna deadpans. She can’t tell if she’s genuinely worried about the possibility, or if she’s just trying to lighten the mood.

“Yeah… that would be a big problem. Take care of her,” Abe says and then he’s on his way, leaving Anna and Robert alone with the Declaration of Independence.

They both mutter an ‘I will’ and it’s only slightly weird.

\----

Out on the street, Anna and Robert try to walk fast without being seen. It works for a few minutes. They’re able to get themselves into a crowd of people moving the same way, and it’s working. It’s working until Robert stops and turns for a moment and sees Bradford and MacInnes trailing behind them. Bradford punches MacInnes’ shoulder, pointing in their direction, and the two are off towards Robert and Anna.

Anna looks behind to where Robert’s looking and curses. “And now we run.”

The two take off, trying to push people out of the way as gracefully and polite as they can. Judging by the yells and shouts from behind them, Bradford and MacInnes aren’t trying to be anywhere near as nice. They turn up Ranstead street and after weaving up and down various city blocks, eventually come to the Reading Terminal Market. It’s a large indoor market that they can easily lose their pursuers in, so Anna doesn’t question it when Robert pulls her inside. Unfortunately, they end up losing each other, and Anna has no time to backtrack to try and find Robert.

Before Bradford or MacInnes can fully catch up with her, Anna hops the counter at a butcher shop and crouches beneath the counter. She’s breathing hard when the woman who works there clears her throat above her. “If you’re not a steak, get out.”

“Oh, I’m sorry ma’am. It’s just, I was hiding from my ex-husband. He’s a bit of a douche.” Anna turns around to peak through the glass of the meat case and sees Bradford looming, looking around for either her or Robert.

The cashier hums. “Your ex-husband the one with the stupid hat on?” Anna turns around to verify that the woman has the right man.

“Yep.”

“Mmm… honey, you stay here as long as you like.” The words are like music to Anna’s ears. She breathes out a thank you and sits with her back to the display case.

Bradford walks up to the counter a moment later, and Anna holds her breath while the cashier asks if she can help him. After felling her to “fuck off”, he leaves in a huff to most likely try and find Robert. Anna breathes again. “Now I see why you left him, honey,” the woman says, and Anna can’t help but laugh lightly to herself.

Once Bradford is far enough away for her comfort, and the cashier agrees that it’s probably safe by now, Anna climbs out from behind the counter and begins the process of trying to find Robert. It’s a process that she expected would take significantly longer than it actually does. Carefully, Anna retraces her steps and finds him soon afterwards. Robert’s crouched behind a floor display in some bath shop looking for either Bradford or MacInnes.

Sneaking up behind him, Anna taps Robert on the shoulder, causing him to jump nearly a foot in the air. He spins around with a shout that Anna tries to shush before anyone around them can look over.

“Where were you?” Robert asks, voice normal once more.

“Hiding from Bradford. Now let’s go, before one of them finds us.” Robert nods, and the two of them manage to get out of the shopping plaza before Bradford or MacInnes notice.

It’s not long though before Anna turns around and sees Bradford with MacInnes trailing behind, and gaining on them. Anna calculates that they run about three more blocks before coming up on Philadelphia’s massive City Hall.

They barely have time to glance up at the looming structure before Robert’s running into the tunnels that run through the exterior of the building. Anna looks over her shoulder quickly, but when she looks ahead again, a gaggle of business men has seemed to have sprung up from nowhere. She gets caught even as Robert continues to run towards the open tunnel end that comes out to the corner of Market and 13th Street.

As Anna struggles to free herself, she sees the bike come into view as if in slow motion. Robert turns around to Anna’s yelling, but it’s too late. As he turns, the bike side swipes him and Robert loses his footing, hitting the pavement hard. Anna can’t tell if he hits his head, but she sees Robert look up frantically to see the Declaration rolling around in the middle of the crosswalk in its gray case.

He gets up frantically and runs into the road to try and get it, but clearly doesn’t see the semi-truck barreling towards him. Anna sprints faster than she’s ever sprinted in her entire life to get to him and pull him away, the two of them landing on their backs as she succeeds in saving Robert’s life.

When the both are able to sit up, they see the worst thing they could have imagined. Standing in the crosswalk with traffic stopped on either side is Benedict Arnold. He’s holding the Declaration in his hands with the smuggest grin Anna’s ever seen grace someone’s face. She wants to punch it right off. Anna can practically feel the anger radiating off of Robert.

Behind them, Anna hears the heavy footsteps of Bradford and MacInnes finally catching up. Quickly pulling Robert to his feet, they’re able to get away, but hear Arnold tell the two that they’re fine to get away. Anna lets out a breath she hadn’t realized she was holding.

When City Hall is out of their view, Anna and Robert actually slow to a walking pace and allow themselves to breathe. They hold off on calling Abe for a few minutes out of either fear of how he’ll react, or frustration that they lost the Declaration. In the end, Anna decides to call him.

The phone dials for three rings before Abe picks up on the other end. “Abe? We lost it.”

The other end of the line is silent as Abe probably figures out if it’s a joke or not. “You what?”

“We lost it. We lost the Declaration; Arnold has it.”

She can hear Abe suck in a huge breath as if to calm himself before he responds. Anna knew he would be upset. “You know what? That’s fine. You both are safe?”

“Yeah.”

“Alright. Meet me by the car and we’ll talk further about how to fix this.”

“Alright. We’ll see you in about fifteen.” She looks to Robert when she hangs up the phone with a sigh. “He wants us to meet him at the car. Do you know where we are?”

Robert smiles and pushes her down to the end of the side street they’re currently standing in. “That’s why we have maps.”


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is it. The end. All 65 pages, 24,854 words of it. Phew
> 
> In this chapter we explore some action sequences where we see if I can write in an action sense. I may or may not have excelled. You can be the judge.
> 
> There's a few notes on some plot points down in bottom notes that I didn't want to put up here in these, so look for those. 
> 
> Anyway, I don't have a beta still, so any mistake you see is still my fault.
> 
> Enjoy and let me know what you think of it.

When Abe gets to the car, he’s in the middle of unlocking it when a tall man steps out from the store behind him, smile on his face and all. “Hello, Mr. Woodhull.” His face is slender, and he has chin length brown hair with an odd braid hanging out in the back. Abe falters with his keys as he tries to see the bigger picture. It’s only a few seconds before more people come out of the café, this time with guns and handcuffs.

“Mr. Woodhull, please face your father’s car and put your hands behind your back.” Facing the car, one FBI agent empties out his pockets while another handcuffs his wrists just a tad too tight. Among the items slammed onto the roof of the car are Ben Franklin’s glasses.

“You’re a hard man to find, Mr. Woodhull,” the man with the braid says, coming into Abe’s line of sight. Abe grimaces at the remark.

A flicker of movement catches Abe’s eye at the street corner while the agents are cataloguing Abe’s valuables. Robert and Anna see him for a split second before they quickly turn around and hurry away before they’re noticed. Abe wants to scream. He wants to scream at how close they got. Scream at Arnold for taking the Declaration. Scream at his father. Instead, he stands there quietly, waiting for them to take him into FBI custody.

\---- 

Robert paces for several minutes before Anna tells him to calm down in the most exhausted voice Robert’s ever heard. He knows that getting caught was always a distinct and almost certain possibility, he just didn’t realize he’d care that much about getting caught. He had figured he would play the victim and get out of any punishment when it happened. Now though, Robert has fully and eagerly participated in this treasure hunt; he’s as much at fault for this entire operation as Abe and Anna now.

“What are we supposed to do now? Abe’s going to prison, Arnold has the Declaration. We don’t even have the damn glasses to bargain with.” Anna looks up at Robert from the park bench she’s sitting in. Her hair’s fallen out of its pony tail, and she’s got her head propped up in her hand. Robert doesn’t even think she’s awake enough to listen to him properly.

“Wait,” he says after a minute of silence. “Anna, do you know how to get in touch with Arnold? I have a plan.” This gets Anna’s attention, and she sits up straight to look at him like he’s absolute nuts.

“Excuse me?" 

“I’m going to make Arnold get Abe out of prison.”

\----

The interrogation chair is cold and hard, everything Abe figured it would be. At least that’s one thing the television shows didn’t lie to him about. The man who confronted him with the braid—John Andre he learns, sits across from him in silence. Two other FBI agents by the names of Tallmadge and Brewster stand behind him, one with blonde hair, the other with curly brown. Abe catalogues their faces.

He’s just gotten through with telling them the entire story from start to finish, and he can tell that the agents don’t believe him. “That’s an interesting story,” Andre starts off. He folds his hands on the table in front of him and looks behind himself to the other two agents.

“Yeah, well it’s the same exact story I tried to tell you guys before the Declaration was stolen.”

“By you,” Andre supplies unhelpfully.

Abe’s patience is wearing thin. “ _No_ , by Benedict Arnold. I stole it to stop him. I did it alone. Dr. Townsend was not involved… And Arnold still ended up with the Declaration of Independence.” The entire situation deeply depressed Abe.

“Because of you.” Andre prods. Abe throws him a look without answering. “Okay,” Andre continues. “Here’re you options: door number one, you go to prison for a very long time. Door number two, we are going to get back the Declaration of Independence, you help us find it, and you still go to prison for a very long time, but you feel better inside.”

Abe can tell Andre is trying to be amusing while also being 100% serious, but Abe currently doesn’t feel like he’s in a laughing mood. “Is there an option that doesn’t lead to jail?”

Andre cocks his head to the side and laughs to himself. “Abe, someone has to go to prison.”

“Right.” Abe tries to adjust his hands, but the chains connected to his handcuffs rattle unpleasantly. They remind him that he’s a criminal in this situation.

Andre picks up Ben Franklin’s glasses that are sat on the table in front of them and fiddles with the levers on each side of the three layers of glass. “And… what are these for?”

“They’re a way to read the map.”

“Oh right, Knights Templar and all of that. You know, I’ve always been a big fan of Franklin and his inventions. He made these you said, right?” Abe nods and Andre smiles. “So, Freemasons, invisible treasure map. What did it say?”

“’Heere at the Wall’.” Abe sighs. There’s more to the clue, but it’s none of John Andre’s business that ‘Heere’ is actually spelt with two e’s and not one. “Nothing else… just another clue. That’s how it always is.” He watches as Andre continues to play with the different levers, exposing different colors each time a different one is raised. Abe’s suddenly struck with the thought that there’s more to the map than just ‘Heere at the Wall’. They never checked the other levers to see if there was more before. Abe desperately wants to hug John Andre and leave as quick as he can to go tell Anna and Robert.

Abe’s broken out of his reverie by his cellphone ringing on the table between them; Andre snatches it up. He looks to Brewster and Tallmadge who have their equipment ready to track the call. There is no caller id, but Abe already knows without a doubt that it’s Arnold.

Andre accepts the call and hands the phone off to Abe. Abe, trying to hold it with two cuffed wrists, takes a breath before talking. “Hello?”

“Hello, Abe. How are you?” It’s Arnold. Abe seethes at the other man’s voice.

“Oh you know, I’ve been better. I’m currently chained to a desk.”

Arnold laughs across the line. “I’m sorry to hear that. Listen, I want you to meet me on the flight deck of the USS Intrepid. Do you know where that is?”

“New York,” Abe supplies without thinking. He grew up there after all.

“Meet me there at ten o'clock tomorrow morning. And bring those glasses you found at Independence Hall.” He pauses for a moment and Abe knows Arnold knows he’s confused. “Yeah, I know about the glasses. We can take a look at the Declaration, and then you can be on your way.”

Abe scoffs. “And I’m supposed to believe that?”

“I told you from the start, Abe. I only wanted to borrow it. You can have it, and the glasses. Hell, I’ll even throw in the pipe from ‘Charlotte’.”

Abe looks up at Andre who has his own earphones plugged into the call. He can hear every word that Arnold is saying. Andre nods in affirmation. “I’ll be there.”

Arnold hums in satisfaction. “Oh, and tell the FBI agents listening in on this call, that if they want the Declaration back in one piece, and not a box of confetti, you’ll come alone. Understand? Good.” Arnold doesn’t let Abe get in another word before the phone line goes quiet, and the connection is dead.

“New York,” Andre hums to himself. He looks over at the other agents next to them and nods. “Looks like we’d better get going then.”

\----

New York is the same as Abe remembers it, if a little nicer. Abe doesn’t remember the last time he saw the Hudson, but he doesn’t remember it looking quite so brown. The sun is out, but it’s still brisk in the October breeze blowing off of the river. The Intrepid is heavy with tourist foot traffic when Andre releases him out onto the deck to roam around and wait for Arnold.

There’s an earpiece in his ear that feels entirely too snug, and Abe feels like the sound of the helicopter flying above him is entirely too deafening. He sees two agents in disguise across the deck from him, and he has no doubt that this is going to fall apart quickly. His hands are sweating ever so slightly, and Abe feels his heart beating faster than normal.

Abe watches twenty or so boy scouts walk past him on the flight deck, shirts tucked in tight and eyes bright with excitement. “I hope your agents are all under four feet tall and wearing little scarves, otherwise Arnold will know they’re here.”

“Just stay calm and stick to the plan. As soon as he shows you the Declaration, we’ll move in. Don’t try anything, just let us handle it.”

“You know, Agent Andre, the thing about fishing, is that it never turns out well for the bait.” Andre chuckles in his ear but says nothing.

A low flying chopper comes out of the north and startles Abe’s attention away from the crowd of people. It’s low, lower than the FBI’s, and lower than a tourist’s chopper should be. Abe has not a doubt in his mind that that’s Arnold. He hears the various agents yelling at each other over their own mics.

“Woodhull, are you still with me?” Andre asks, a slight tinge of panic creeping into his voice.

“Well I’m sure not against you, if that’s what you’re asking.” He walks over the one of the handrails and looks down at the dark water below.

There’s a slight static in his ear, and then Bradford is at his shoulder all in a matter of thirty seconds. “Hello, Abe.” Abe looks over to the other man and sees a dangerous smile on his face. He’s got a video camera in his hand to try and make himself look less conspicuous. “Thomas Edison only needed one way to make a light bulb. Sound familiar?”

Abe registers the words as the ones he told Anna in the Library of Congress, and realizes they must be working together. That would be the only reason Arnold knew about the glasses as well. Before Bradford says anymore, the intruding helicopter drops extremely low, causing commotion in his ear, as well as around the deck. People are running away from the blades, and the FBI is shouting at them from their own helicopter. It’s complete chaos.

“Listen, here’s what you’re going to do. Go to the starboard observation point behind the AF Cougar. You’re gonna jump overboard into the river where we’ll have Hickey there waiting for you with a spare diving regulator. He’ll take you away and you’ll meet up with Arnold away from these prying eyes. Good?” Abe nods, afraid of the outcome if he had replied with a negative answer. 

Bradford nods and moves away from him at seemingly the same time as the helicopter pulls away. Almost as soon as the chaos started, it’s over. He can hear Andre and the others in his ear again, and as he walks to the starboard observation deck, he can hear them clamoring about what he’s doing, and if Arnold is there waiting.

When he gets there, he only has seconds before they’ll be back on him. “Andre. I’m still not against you, but I found door number three. And I’m taking it.” Hearing Andre’s frantic voice in his ear, Abe steps up onto and over the railing, jumping towards the murky depths of the Hudson river.

The fall takes forever. His stomach is practically up in his throat, and he’s so ready for this to be over with. Hitting the water from that height is pretty much as bad as the media says it is. The cold water is like a jolt to his system; Abe opens his mouth to gasp before remembering he’s underwater. Sure enough though, Hickey is there waiting for him with a spare regulator and a way to get them out of there before the FBI’s dive team gets to their location. If there’s one thing jumping into the water did, it’s bring Abe some much needed quiet from all the FBI Agents chirping in his ear.

\----

Back on dry land, Abe feels like a drowned rat. His clothes are heavy on him with water, and he feels dirty from the Hudson. After Hickey practically pushes him up the dock latter, Bradford is there waiting with a towel and a fresh set of clothes.

“Hello Abe, welcome to New Jersey.”

Abe’s grateful and all, but clothes aren’t necessarily at the forefront of his mind right now. “What’d you do with Robert and Anna?”

“Hope these fit. We had to guess your sizes.” Bradford walks around the car and opens the rear door for Abe, ushering him in.

“I said, what did you do with Robert and Anna? Anna’s the only one who could have told you that line abut Edison.”

“Did you bring the glasses?”

“I don’t know, tell me what’s going on here.”

Bradford turns on him with a scowl, and gets up in Abe’s face. “Ask your boyfriend. He’s the one that’s calling all the shots now, anyway.” Bradford walks away to pull out his phone, presumably to call Arnold.

The line though, takes Abe by surprise. He didn’t think that Anna and Robert would ever team up with Arnold and his goons after the few days they’ve had, much less come out on top. A smile crosses Abe’s face as he gets into the car. Anna and Robert are safe. Robert is calling the shots. Robert sounds like he’s going out of his mind with worry over Abe. Alright.

\----

Robert and Anna call Abe from a small coffee shop across the street from Trinity Church where they watch Arnold pick his way around the graveyard backing up to Rector Street. They told him they’d be watching while they called Abe and figured out the plan, and so he reluctantly went across the street.

The phone rings for one and a half rings before Abe answers. “Hello?" 

Robert clears his voice before speaking. He tries to act normal with the amount of people around him, but at this point, it’s a little difficult. “Hi, sweetie. How’s your day going?”

Abe stumbles on the other line, and Robert finds himself smiling. “Uh, interesting dear. You’re working with Arnold now?”

“Well, turns out breaking someone out of FBI custody is a crime, so we turned to the only criminal we knew. We called him and made a deal.” He tries to make it sound like it’s no big deal, but Robert knows it’s a very big deal.

“Well you’re… you’re… you’re alright, right? You guys are safe?”

“Yeah, we’re both safe. Anna’s over here doing something clever with a computer. Talk to her.”

Robert holds the phone up to Anna’s ear so that she can type but still talk. “Hey, Abe! I’m tracking you through the GPS in Bradford’s phone. If he doesn’t go exactly where we want him to go, the deal’s off.  If Arnold tries to double-cross us, we can call the FBI and let them know where you are, and where to find Arnold.”

“And where is that?” Abe asks, curious.

Robert takes the phone from Anna so she can finish typing out a few things. “Right across the street in Trinity Church on the corner of Broadway and Wall Street.”

Robert can hear the smile in Abe’s voice as he responds to the news that they figured out the clue. “You figured it out.”

“It was simple. ‘Heere at the Wall. Wall street and Broadway.” The truth was, it took about twenty-five minutes of serious thinking for Anna and Robert to both come up with the clue. It was Anna in the end, with her knowledge of old street names that finally connected the dots. “Uh, Abe? There is a catch to all of this. We told Arnold he could have the treasure. It was the only way to get him to help us get this far.” Abe’s silent on the other line and Robert frowns to himself.

Anna interrupts his train of thought though as she closes out of the computer she was using. “He’s here,” she says, an element of relief in her voice. “Here we go…”

\----

The light blinds Abe as he gets out of the town car. The windows had been blacked out, and now the sun is threatening to blind him. He sees Arnold come up from behind with a large smile on his face. He’s got the Declaration slung over his shoulder, and Abe sighs in relief.

“Abe! How are you? No broken bones? A fall like that could kill a man, you know.” Arnold talks as if they were two long lost friends that hadn’t seen each other in a few months. That may have been true at one point, but now Abe wants nothing more but to see Arnold behind bars.

“Nah, it was fun. You should try it sometime.”

Arnold chuckles and slams the Declaration and the Meerschaum pipe down on the roof of the car. “Declaration and pipe, all yours.”

“That’s it?” It seems too simple to Abe, but here he is.

“That’s it.” Arnold stares unnervingly at Abe for a few moments before continuing. “So, where’s my treasure?”

Abe sighs. Here it is. “It’s right here. The map said ‘Heere at the Wall’, spelled with two e’s. Wall street used to be an actual wall, and Broadway used to be named De Heere before the British moved in. Therefore, ‘Heere at the Wall’ where Broadway meets Wall Street. Have a good day now.” Abe grabs the Declaration and the pipe from the roof of the car, and is nearly gone when Arnold speaks again.

“Is that all the map said?”

Abe hesitates for a moment, and he knows it’s a mistake as soon as he doesn’t reply with a simple ‘yes’. “Every word.”

“Oh Abe. If you’re going to lie convincingly, make sure you’re holding all of the cards.” Arnold sounds absolutely smug, and Abe has no idea what he could be on about. His mind flits to Anna and Robert, but they’re the ones holding Arnold, so it’s probably not them.

Arnold nods his head across the street to a black Range Rover, and the man standing at the rear passenger side door opens it to reveal a duct taped Richard Woodhull. Abe feels the breath leave his lungs in a rush. This is absolutely not what he wanted, nor needed. There’s no way out of this.

“Is there anything else you want to tell me?”

Abe sighs in defeat. “Trinity church. We have to go inside Trinity Church.”

The atmosphere inside Trinity Church is calm and inviting. The air is about the same temperature as outside, and there aren’t many people inside. The pews stretch nearly the entire way up the aisle, and the vaulted ceilings draw Abe’s attention for several moments. He doesn’t think he’s ever been inside Trinity Church, even when he lived here. As the last people leave, Arnold closes the doors and throws the latch.

He sends Hickey to fetch Richard out of the car, and he sends MacInnes and Bradford to get Robert and Anna. Hickey ends up coming back first with Richard in tow. Abe may have his problems with his father, but he never wished him to be tied up with duct tape and dragged up to New York in order to be a hostage in this ever growing treasure hunt.

“Dad, are you okay?”

Richard gives him a look that says it all. A look that says ‘don’t you dare try to ask if I’m okay. You’re the one who dragged me into the mess’. Instead, he says something much less hostile. “Oh yeah, I just love being a hostage in your games.” So maybe not much less hostile.

Abe tries to say something back, but Bradford and MacInnes choose that time to barge their way through the doors with Robert and Anna in front of them. They’re not tied up like Richard, so at least there’s that. He doesn’t get a chance to talk to either of them before Bradford shoves the two into a pew towards the rear of the church.

“Let’s look at that map, shall we?” Arnold says, getting Abe’s attention. Abe knows Arnold did this on purpose. Leuer Robert and Anna into a false sense of security where they have all the power, only to rip it out from under them. Abe doesn’t know why he didn’t put the pieces together sooner.

Conceding defeat, Abe takes the Declaration off of his shoulder and hands it to Arnold, who takes it out carefully to unroll it. Abe pulls the glasses out of his jacket pocket and puts them on while Arnold holds the map out. Using the possible new information that Andre inadvertently showed him, Abe plays around with the different layers of colored glass until a new message appears. His breath escapes him as he looks down and sees the words ‘Beneath Parkington Lane’.

“It’s… it’s really quite something. Wow.” He takes off the glasses and hands them to Arnold to look at for himself. “Take a look”

Arnold puts the glasses on and releases a small gasp. “Parkington Lane? Why would the map lead us here only to make us go somewhere else?”

“Just another clue,” Richard says loud enough for Abe to hear. Abe purposely ignores him.

Looking around the church at the vaulted ceilings, altar, and other adornments, Abe makes his mind up. “No… no it’s got to be here. Parkington Lane must be here in the church somewhere.”

“A road in a church? Doesn’t that sound odd to you?” Arnold sounds skeptical, and Abe doesn’t blame him at this point.

“Not inside, no. _Beneath_ Parkington Lane. It’s below the church. We need to go down.” Abe stands up and takes the glasses that Arnold hands back to him while Arnold rolls the map back up.

It only takes a few minutes of looking to find the door down to the crypt. Hickey finds it on the right side near the back of the altar. It’s only another minute or so after that before Arnold’s yanking the door open with Abe and walking in. Abe ends up holding the door in an effort to talk to Anna and Robert as they both pass through last.

“I’m so sorry, Abe,” Robert whispers as they walk through the doorway. Robert’s the last person in line, so Abe closes it behind him as they both walk through.

“Hey, _none_ of this is your fault.” Robert nods, but whether or not he truly believes Abe’s words is another matter entirely.

The stairs down to the crypt don’t take too long. Even though it’s dark, Abe can tell that the crypt is small. He figures the ceilings are about six and a half feet high, so while he can’t reach the ceiling, Robert and Arnold’s heads nearly brush it.

Richard finds Abe among the scattering of people and pulls him to the side before Arnold can call Abe back to attention. “Abe, cooperation only lasts as long as the status quo is unchanged. As soon as this guy gets to wherever this thing ends, he won't need you anymore. He won’t need… any of us.” He sounds nervous, and Abe honestly can’t blame him at this point. The promise of wealth drives people to do insane things, whether you know the person or not. 

“So we find a way to change the status quo to our favor.” It’s a lot easier said than done, and Abe knows it. They’ll figure out something though, they always do.

“How?”

“I’m still working on that.”

Richard nods in contemplation and turns his head to look around at the others. “Yeah, well I guess I should start thinking on that too.”

Anna’s voice rips Abe out of his thoughts of a plan with her exclamation of discovery. “Hey! I found it! Parkington Lane!”

They all rush over to where she’s standing in front of a grave, flashlight dancing wildly. “Huh, it’s a name,” Abe says quietly to himself. “He was a third degree Mason master of the Blue Lo--.”

Hickey chooses that moment to come swinging at the gravestone with a large wrench capable of killing a man. Abe just manages to jump out of the way before being nailed with it himself. The headstone breaks apart into a hundred pieces as Hickey beats at it until there’s a clear opening to the coffin. Hickey and Arnold pull it out and hold it at waist level until the bottom falls out in a great display of dust, cobwebs, and bones. There’s yelling as Hickey tells people not to step in it. Carefully, they lower the coffin lid down around the body.

Devoid of a coffin, the grave looks to stretch on and then curve off somewhere they can’t see from their current vantage point. To say it’s dirty would be an understatement. There are cobwebs thickly strewn about the entire way, and dirt that must be at least three inches thick on all sides of the stone.

Anna breaks the silence. “Okay, who wants to go down the creepy tunnel inside the tomb first?”

Arnold turns around towards his men and points at Hickey. “You, stay here. If anyone comes back out without me, well… use your imagination.” Abe shudders at the thought. “Right, so who’s going first?" 

At the lack of volunteers, Abe sighs and walks towards the tunnel opening. It takes all of his strength not to shudder at the cobwebs and what might be lurking in them, waiting for them. His flashlight beam is narrow, but it gets the job done enough for him to get to the end and out into an open staircase with a torch on the wall. When Arnold crawls through, he fishes his lighter out of his pants pocket and lights the torch. Somehow, it lights.

Not waiting to see if anyone’s following him, Abe begins walking down another flight of steps, this one steeper than the last. The torch is a much better light source than his small flashlight, and he silently thanks the people who lined the walls with them.

There’s a fallen beam up ahead that Abe stops at to help people over in the dim light. He helps his dad, Anna, and Robert over, but when Robert clears the obstacle, he doesn’t let go of his arm. When he pulls Robert around to face him, Abe takes Robert’s jacket in his free hand, and pulls his face down a few inches to meet his. It’s a quick kiss that doesn’t last for long, but Abe’s satisfied that he did it. When Robert pulls away, he doesn’t look offended, but instead has a soft smile on his face. They don’t say anything, but Abe knows they’ll talk later, should they survive.

Coming down the stairs, Abe can practically feel the close quarters of the stairwell expand into a wide cavern. His torch helps, of course, see the enormous wooden chandelier tied off to the side of an old wooden banister. 

Arnold walks up to it and gingerly runs his hand over the ancient wood. “What’s this?” he asks.

“It’s a chandelier.” Abe lowers his torch to one of the chandelier’s own torches to catch fire. He’s fully prepared to light every single torch, but the Freemasons clearly anticipated the hassle of doing such a thing. Instead of lighting every single individual one, the flame from the first travels around the chandelier and lights the rest of the torches.

The effect is magnificent and unlike anything Abe’s ever seen before. He unties the chandelier from the wooden banister and they all watch as it swings towards the center of the cavern, fully illuminating the entire room.

Around a large pit in the center, is a seemingly never-ending staircase to the bottom of the never-ending pit. Abe thinks it must be at least thirty feet to the other side. He’s not interested in testing his luck.

Bradford points at two platforms suspended away and down from the stairs by a few feet. “Elevators. Like a dumbwaiter." 

Arnold seems to stare at the stairs and the elevator for a second longer before he grabs Richard and shoves him to the front near the staircase to go first. “Alright, let’s get on with this.”

Richard shakes his head and tries to push against Arnold’s large form. “I’m not going on that. It’s been down here for hundreds of years. It’s probably got hundreds of years of termite damage. It just spells disaster.”

“Dad, just do what he says, please,” Abe pleads from the back of the line.

It doesn’t take long after that before Richard is reluctantly walking in the front of the line, followed by Bradford, Arnold, MacInnes, Anna, Abe, and Robert. The trek down the stairs is slow going. With every step, Abe can hear the groan of the wood beneath their feet along with the nervous noises from Anna in front of him.

“Imagine,” he hears Arnold whisper to the front of the line. “Right under Trinity graveyard. Probably why no one ever found it.” Abe can think of a few other reasons why nobody ever found it, but being under the graveyard is probably a strong one.

They’re a few flights down when the entire room begins to shake, as if in an earthquake. There’s no banister in the section of stairs they’re on, so most of them clutch a hand to the rock wall. The shaking passes in a few seconds, and Abe realizes what it was. It’s pretty obvious now that he thinks of it. “Subway…”

They stand still for another minute before MacInnes takes a step forward and goes straight through the wooden floor. Robert yells out, but MacInnes doesn’t have time to grab onto anything or anyone, and Abe is so stunned that he doesn’t reach out in time. Peering over the edge, he sees the man tumble into another landing and fall straight through that one as well. 

A few seconds later, the entire platform seems to disconnect from the wall. Saving herself, Anna jumps to a platform below the one they were currently standing on. Richard, Arnold, and Bradford jump forward away from the falling landing, but Abe and Robert aren’t so lucky.

Abe goes sliding down the wood, Declaration in hand when Robert catches his hand to haul him back up onto a stable landing. He sees his dad, along with Arnold and Bradford climbing on their own elevator near their current spot, and pulls Robert onto the other one near them. Abe sees Anna below them and begins to lower the elevator to his friend’s rescue.

The dust has only just barely settled when Abe gets to Anna with the elevator. Rob’s leaning to one side, trying to catch his breath after the hectic moment they had just had. As Abe reaches out to grab Anna’s hand, the elevator Abe and Robert are on decides to go into free fall.

Anna screams after them as Abe and Robert cling to the rickety sides. When the elevator reaches the end of its rope, the side Robert is on snaps, nearly sending him off of the platform. Abe’s thrown to the deck as well, Declaration gone from the loose position it held on his shoulder. He doesn’t immediately think of that though. Abe’s first instinct is to catch at Robert’s wrist as he slides off the elevator’s side, a yell caught in his throat. When Robert stops falling, Abe breathes a sigh of relief, Robert smiling weakly up at him.

Before Abe can pull Robert back up and onto the now broken elevator, Robert’s gaze catches on a spot nearly behind Abe. “Abe, the Declaration!”

Abe turns his head and hisses out in frustration. As the remains of the elevator swings on its remaining ropes, Abe looks down and can see them swinging over another landing that’s still intact. He looks back to Rob and sucks in a breath. “Do you trust me?”

Robert barely hesitates before answering Abe. “Yes.” As the word leaves his lips, Abe drops Robert over the platform, an audible gasp leaving the latter’s lungs. As soon as Robert’s gone from his hands, Abe lunges for the other side of the platform to grab the Declaration just as it nearly falls over the side. Only after it’s in his hands does he look to see that Robert’s standing up near the wall holding his left arm gingerly.

As if his luck couldn’t get any worse, the elevator drops further, throwing Abe off of his feet and down into the same predicament Robert had just been in. This time though, there’s no one above him to help, and the platform has stopped swinging. He tries to climb back up the steep incline like a ladder, but the boards break out from underneath him one by one. Abe thinks that this is it. He’s come this far only to die under the graveyard of Trinity Church. It’s oddly fitting.

As the nails begin to rip out of the last board, a saving grace in the form of a rope from above falls down to his hands. He looks up to see the source and sees Arnold above him with the rope clutched in his hands. Taking it quickly, Abe grabs on and swings to the safety of an intact landing a bit further from Robert’s.

When his feet hit the floor, Robert’s instantly on him, enveloping him in a hug he honestly hadn’t been expecting. “I’m so sorry I dropped you. I had to save the Declaration.” Abe’s voice is hoarse, though from the dust and mold or from screaming, he isn’t sure.

Robert looks at him with a serious face. “Don’t be. I would have done the same exact thing to you.”

Certainly not expecting that answer, Abe narrows his eyes at the taller man. “Really?”

Robert smiles this time and nods. Their surroundings seem quieter now, broken only by Anna’s tired voice coming down a set of stairs to their right. “I would have dropped both of you freaks.” Abe smiles to the two of them, though it’s broken relatively quickly as Arnold, Richard, and Bradford lower themselves down in their elevator.

“Get in,” Arnold snarls. He seems angrier than before, if that were even possible.

“Arnold, is that really a good idea? We just lost MacInnes, we don’t need to lose anymore.” Abe tries to plead with Arnold, but it’s clear he would need more to convince him it wasn’t safe.

“No. MacInnes is why we keep going. Don’t think that any of your lives mean more to me than he did. You don’t.” Abe thinks the words sound harsh, but he figures he can equate the feeling to how he’d feel if it had been Anna or Robert who had fallen through the floor. Abe decides not to dwell on the fact.

Practically at gunpoint, Arnold gets Abe, Anna, and Robert onto the elevator, and the descend for a few more floors before coming to a clear debarkation ledge. Abe’s practically the first one off that damn elevator.

The room they debark at is hexagonal in shape, faded frescos on each side, save for the entrance where a singular lantern hangs over the doorway. There’s a short alcove beneath the fresco on the furthest wall so naturally, that’s where Arnold drifts to.

Standing by the entrance, Abe gazes at each individual fresco, trying to simultaneously take everything in while hunting for clues. He’s failing so far. Across the room, Arnold grunts in frustration.

Anna runs her fingers across one of the frescos and sighs. They’re all so exhausted, mentally and physically, but of course they haven’t found the treasure yet. “So where’s the treasure?”

“It’s a dead end. There’s no other way,” Abe feels like he wants to scream, but holds out hope that this is just another road block. An idea occurs to him that if he can play the next few minutes off with Arnold, he’ll be able to turn the tables to their advantage. Just like Richard warned about. A part of him worries that this is the end though; a part of him has known it may end like this all along.

“But there has to be another way!” Anna barks in frustration.

“There, isn’t. This is the end. There are no more clues!” he yells in Anna’s direction. He feels bad for yelling at her, but he needs to keep up this ruse.

Arnold stalks over to where Abe’s standing near the fresco by the entrance. He gets as close as he can to Abe, staring daggers at the shorter man. Abe unconsciously takes a step backward to try to get away from the looming form of Benedict Arnold. “You aren’t playing games with me now, are you Woodhull?”

“I told you, there _are_ no more clues! This is it.”

Throwing one last murderous look at Abe, Arnold makes the short walk back to the elevator, Bradford already reading his mind and heading there himself. They’re on the elevator and hoisting it back towards the surface by the time Anna, Robert, Abe, and Richard are able to realize what’s happening.

“You can’t just leave us down here!” Abe calls as the two men begin to ascend, desperate to knock some sense into Arnold. Honestly though, it’s a lost cause.

Arnold stops cranking the elevator for a minute to look down at the four stranded people. “Then tell me where the treasure is, Abe. Tell me the next clue!”

“Arnold, why don’t you just come back down here and we can just--.” Anna tries to placate Arnold, but before she can finish speaking, Arnold pulls his gun from the waistband of his pants and aims it at various members of the remaining party. Abe realizes they may never get out of here alive now, treasure or not.

When no one speaks for several moments, Arnold cocks the gun in his hand. Richard must blurt the first thing that comes to his mind, but it startles and worries Abe nonetheless. “The lantern,” he says. Abe knows that the lantern hanging near the entrance doesn’t really mean anything. Perhaps a way to throw potential treasure seekers off of the trail. It’s not the actual way to find the treasure. He sees what his dad is setting up here. A way to change the status quo into their favor.

He goes along with it anyway. “Dad, stop.”

Ignoring his son, Richard prattles on. “It's all a part of Freemason teachings. In King Solomon's temple there was a winding staircase.” Richard gestures to the staircase wrapped around the wall of the pit they’re currently standing at the edge of. “It signified the journey that had to be made to find the light of truth. The lantern is the clue.”

Arnold eyes the lantern above Richard’s head and raises an eyebrow. Abe tries his best to look disappointed in his father’s admission. Really though, if they can get Arnold to believe Richard’s new clue, they have a chance of getting out of there alive. “And what does it mean?”

“Boston, it’s Boston,” Abe responds, sure of where Richard is going with this now. He’s tricking Arnold with fake history that Arnold himself probably doesn’t know the specifics of. And on top of feeding Arnold fake history to a fake clue, he’s going to trick Arnold into taking them with him so that they can escape.

“The Old North Church in Boston, where Thomas Newton hung a lantern in the steeple, to signal Paul Revere that the British were coming. One if by land, two if by sea. One lantern. Under the winding staircase of the steeple, that's where we have to look.”

Lowering his gun and replacing it in its spot on his waistband, Arnold nods and resumes cranking the elevator back up towards the surface. “Much appreciated.”

“Wait! You have to take us with you!” Richard yells up at Arnold.

Arnold scoffs, his face full of mirth. “Why? So you can escape in Boston? No. If I need you again, I’ll know right where to find you. And if what you’ve told me is a lie, well… I’ll know right where to find you.” Before Abe can say anything more, Arnold cranks the elevator higher, sending him and Bradford out of view, on their way to the surface; to freedom.

“We’re all going to die,” Anna mutters to herself, hopelessness setting in.

As soon as Abe figures they’re out of earshot though, he turns to walk past Anna back into the room, patting her on the shoulder as he passes. “No we’re not. I’m sorry I yelled at you earlier, Anna. But we’ll be fine.”

Richard follows Abe back into the hexagonal room, a hopeful grin creeping onto his face. Robert follows after Richard, suspicion lacing his voice. “Okay boys, what’s going on? The British came by sea; it was two lanterns, not one.”

“Arnold needed another clue, so we gave him another clue,” Richard supplies, clearing the cobwebs off of the frescos with more vigor now.

“You gave them a fake clue.” Anna pulls one of the torches off the wall and stands near the entrance, watching Abe and Richard finish clearing the cobwebs.

Abe hums an affirmative and freezes when he comes to a fresco in particular. The colors are extremely faded and the entire thing is caked with dirt, but Abe can still see the most important part. Staring at him from the middle of the painting is an extremely stylized, all seeing eye. Abe draws in a breath, floored at what he’s seeing. “The all seeing eye…” he murmurs to himself. “’Through the all seeing eye’…”

Anna clears her throat to get Abe’s attention. It only halfway works. “That’s great and all, but we’re still trapped down here. We gave Arnold and Bradford a fake clue, and when they figure out it’s fake, they’re going to come down here and shoot us. Because we’ll still be trapped. Either way, we’re going to die.”

“No one’s going to die. There’s another way out.”

“Another way out? Where?”

Clearing away some dust from the bottom of the fresco, Abe’s able to see a stone button that hasn’t been pressed in a couple hundred years. It’s fitting. Abe leans his entire weight onto the stone button, the grinding of the stone like music to his ears. The fresco and the stone behind it pops inward, revealing the piece to be a door that wasn’t originally present. Abe wants to cry.

Anna laughs from pure joy, eagerly taking Abe’s torch from him, and passing her own over to Robert who looks about equally as happy. Abe gets help from Richard to slide the door out of the way and into the wall so everyone’s able to get into the room adjoining the hexagonal one.

The room is dark at first, the darkness only pushed away when Abe lights the torches adorning either side of the doorway. The room is cavernous compared to the previous hexagonal one, but the most striking difference is the fact that it looks to be in shambles.

Compared to the rest of the rooms they’ve gone in to, this one looks like it’s covered in double the amount of cobwebs. There are lamps on the walls with their shades broken and missing, there are tables with two legs instead of four strewn around the room as if the place has been ransacked, and there’s even a singular gold vase lying towards the middle of the room as if to tell newcomers that this is where the treasure was supposed to be. And now the treasure is gone.

Abe lowers his torch in utter defeat and rakes his eyes across every bit of destroyed furniture around the room. Robert picks through a pile of old crates that practically crumble in his hands, a frown plastered on his face.

“We were too late,” Abe sighs. He was sure about the last room not being the end, but this room proves with almost no room for doubt that the hunt is over. They were too late to this treasure hunt. As Abe thinks about it though, he realizes that he should have seen this coming. The treasure myth was 200 years old, it was almost guaranteed that someone would have found it before them.

Rob comes up behind Abe and rests his free hand on his shoulder in an act of sympathy. Abe appreciates the gesture even if it doesn’t make him feel a whole lot better. “I’m sorry, Abe.”

“It’s gone… The treasure may have been gone even before Charles Carroll told the story to Thomas Gates.”

“Listen Abe,” Richard speaks, calling Abe’s attention to him from the other side of the room. “It doesn’t matter anymore.”

“I know,” Abe laughs at the idea of it all. The idea of all the time he’s wasted. “Because you were right. About everything.”

Richard shakes his head and smiles ruefully. “No, I wasn’t right. I wasn’t right because this room exists. _You_ were right. I gave up on the treasure many years ago. You didn’t. We're in the company of some of the most brilliant minds in history, because you found what they left behind for us to find and understood the meaning of it. You did it, Abe. For all of us. Your grandfather, and all of us. And I've never been so happy to be proven wrong.”

Abe tries smiling at Richard’s words. After all, this is the first time in a long time that Richard’s ever told Abe that he was right about something. Usually it was the other way around. “It’s just… I was so _sure_ that I was going to find the treasure. That this was it.”

“Okay, then we just keep looking for it.”

Robert looks down at Abe and smiles. “I’m in.”

Abe realizes that everyone that matters to him is in the room with him right now trapped under Trinity Church, willing to continue this search with him. Something pangs in his chest, and he knows how lucky he is. Not many people would come this far and still be willing to go farther. “Okay, let’s do this.”

Anna clears her throat from the other side of the room where she’s sitting on a stone bench that’s still upright. “I’m sorry to be Johnny Raincloud here, but that's not going to happen. Because as far as I can see, we're still trapped down here. Either we die down here from dehydration on our own, or Arnold will come back and kill us himself when he finds out that we’ve given him a false clue. Now where is this other way out, Abe?”

Abe nods thoughtfully and huff a sigh. “Now that’s what doesn’t make any sense; because the first thing the builders would have done after getting down here was cut a secondary shaft back out for air in case of cave ins.”

Walking as fast as he can towards the far wall in front of him, Abe waves the torch over several carved plates on the wall. There’s a total of four, one of them with a large indention in the shape of something that Abe swears he’s seen recently. He hands his torch off to Robert and runs his fingers around the edges of it. The weight of the Meerschaum pipe in his jacket suddenly weighs a hundred pounds. Everything makes sense. “It couldn’t be that simple,” he whispers to himself.

Tearing the pipe out of his jacket pocket, Abe disassemble the pipe so that he’s just holding the ship stern in his hand. “The secret lies with _Charlotte_ …” He’s almost afraid to put the pipe into the wall, afraid of being let down again by his hopes. Nevertheless, he gingerly places the ship into its designated spot, and places the pipe stem into the wall perpendicular to the ship. The pipe stem must act like a turnstile.

As soon as he places the pipe stem into the wall, the plate the ship is set in seems to release from its hold. Abe gets the idea to turn the plate counterclockwise until it meets resistance at the 12 o’clock position. Since he’s been pushing buttons and plates into walls all day, he figures that’s probably what he should do next, and low and behold, it works.

Across the room from the group gathered by the plate, a chunk of the wall sinks a few inches, and slides open to reveal yet another doorway. The grinding of stone on stone rings sharply against Abe’s ears, but he can’t find it in himself to care, because treasure or not at this point, they aren’t going to die in here.

When the wall stops moving, Richard is the first one at the door, Anna and Robert following close behind. Abe follows through last, taking a wistful look around the room where the mythical treasure was supposed to have been held one final time.

Through the doorway, Abe doesn’t hear anything from the other three. “Dad?” Abe calls as he steps though the doorway. Richard doesn’t respond, and Abe realizes why exactly two seconds later when he comes up to where Robert, Anna, and Richard are standing.

There in front of Abe is about the last thing he expected to see on their quest to get back above ground. Spread out before Abe is a massive room filled to the brink with gold. There are statues and chests as far as Abe can see, and it makes him want to weep with joy.

The entire group is speechless as Abe walks off to the left where a channel runs down the set of stairs set in front of them. He lowers his torch to the channel and watches as it flares to life with fire that travels the entire length of the room. The fire only reveals more treasure, and with more treasure comes a rickety staircase towards the rear wall that leads up to a door near the ceiling. He hears Anna whisper a teary thanks to God under her breath.

By the time they regroup at the base of the stairs, Abe’s seen more than his fill. Robert reports that he found countless lost scrolls from the Library of Alexandria, Anna found an unknown number of jade and gold statues, and Richard a few hundred gold medals. It’s more than Abe could have hoped for. Not only can he successfully prove that his family isn’t crazy, but he can prove that the treasure is real. There’s real treasure that the Freemasons hid under Trinity Church to keep away from the British. It’s real. Abe’s able to climb the stairs and finally report back to Agent Andre with a smile on his face.

\----

When they finally climb the stairs and break out through the tunnel that the stairs lead them to, they find themselves in the crypt where they started. The only difference? There’s no Arnold, Bradford, or Hickey there waiting for them. Part of Abe thought they might still be there.

Abe ends up using his dad’s cell phone to call Andre and tell him where they are. It doesn’t take long for John Andre and the rest of his FBI team to show up. It feels like minutes. Anna, Robert, and Richard make themselves comfortable in the pews near the middle of the church with Abe sat on the steps of the altar, watching Andre march up the aisle towards him. The young agent has a grimace on his face, an expression no doubt from having to deal with Abe once again. He almost feels bad for the agent. The feeling passes quickly.

When Andre gets up to the altar, Abe stands up and willingly holds out the Declaration in its battered tube. He wishes that he was able to change the tube out for a nice one that would instill more reassurance in Andre, but this would have to do. “Just like this?” Andre asks, holding the tube in his hand.

Abe nods and feels like the weight of the world has lifted off of his shoulders now that the document is back in the hands of the government. “Just like that.”

“You know you just handed me your biggest bargaining chip, right?” Andre sounds skeptical, but Abe figures he should at this point. Abe’s pulled a few surprise twists while in the FBI’s custody.

“The Declaration of Independence isn’t a bargaining chip. Not to me.”

Andre nods and gestures to the first few rows of pews behind him. “Let’s have a talk, shall we?” Abe nods and follows him down the altar steps.

He sees Anna, Robert, and Richard sitting near the back with the blond and brown haired agents that sat in with Abe from D.C. Abe would rather FBI agents watch over them than Arnold’s men any day of the week.

“So what’s your offer?” Andre asks, no doubt curious as to what Abe’s intentions are.

“How about a bribe? Let’s say…. 10 billion dollars?”

Andre looks at Abe with a face full of mirth and lets a chuckle loose. “I take it you found the treasure?”

“It’s about five stories beneath your shoes.”

Andre nods and looks down at the Declaration in his hands. “You know, the Templars and the Freemasons believed that the treasure was too great for any one man to have, not even a king. That's why they went to such lengths to keep it hidden.”

Abe’s surprised that Andre knows so much about the treasure until he sees a ring on Andre’s pinky with the Freemason insignia carved into it. He figures he should have known. “That’s right. The founding fathers believed the same thing about government too. I figured their solution would work for the treasure too.”

“Give it to the people.”

Abe nods. “Divide it amongst the Smithsonian, the Louvre, the Cairo museum… There's thousands of years of world history down there; and it belongs to the world, and everybody in it.”

“You really don’t understand the concept of a bargaining chip.”

Smiling, Abe looks behind himself towards where his friends and father are sitting. He sees Anna laugh silently to herself at Abe’s usual attitude towards this sort of thing. “Okay, here’s what I want. Dr. Townsend gets off completely clean, not even a post-it on his service record.” Andre nods and lets Abe continue. “I want the credit of the find to go to the Gates family with the assistance of Anna Strong.” 

“And what about you?”

Abe chuckles. “I would really love to not go prison. I can’t even _begin_ to explain how much I would love to not go to prison.”

Andre holds his hands up like there’s nothing he can do about Abe’s want. “Someone has to go to prison, Abe.”

A thought strikes Abe so ingenious that he wonders why he didn’t think of it sooner. “Well, if you’ve got a helicopter, I think I can help you with that. His name is Benedict Arnold.”

\----

Despite Anna and Robert advising Abe not to be at the arrest, he convinces them to at least let him watch from a distance. And that’s what he does. Andre and his men find where Arnold and his two remaining men are going to be, and set up a perimeter to catch him. Abe watches from a stoop across the street. 

Seeing the FBI handcuff Arnold and his men is more than Abe could have hoped for. It’s satisfying. When they turn Arnold around to get into the back of the police car, Abe stands up in full view of his old colleague and smiles at the irate man. He salutes him as an extra measure, and relishes how a scowl crosses his features.

\----

** 6 Months Later **

Abe and Robert are walking Anna out to her car at the end of her visit when her phone rings. Abe tunes out what she’s saying, paying attention instead to the grounds of his and Robert’s house that he still hasn’t gotten use to yet.

They’re settled out in the outskirts of Arlington, Virginia, close enough to D.C. if a need arises. With each of their cuts of the treasure money, they were able to buy a house from the early 1800s on about four acres of land.

If someone were to ask Abe six months prior what he’d be doing with his life, he doesn’t think he would have replied with his current status. He’s talking to his father again, Anna’s happily dating a guy named Selah, and he’s got Robert living with him in happy domestic bliss. It’s near perfect.

When Anna hangs up with whoever she’s talking to, she snaps her fingers in front of Abe’s face several times, trying to get his attention. Clearly he had been too deep into his thoughts. “Abe? They want us in Cairo next week for the opening of the exhibit. They're sending a private jet.”

“That sounds fun,” Robert says, smiling over at Abe.

“Yeah,” Anna deadpans. “We could have had a whole fleet of private jets with the money they offered you, Abe. Ten percent. Ten percent they offered you, and you turned it down!”

“Anna, we’ve been over this. Ten percent was too much; I couldn’t take it.”

Anna let’s out a ‘hmpff’ and crosses her arms over her chest. “Yeah well, I have a splinter that’s been festering for the past six months from an old piece of wood.”

“Look, I’ll tell you what, next time we find a treasure that redefines history for all mankind, you make the call on the finder's fee.”

Anna laughs sarcastically as they near her car. “That’s not as funny. What do you care? You got the guy.”

Robert laughs, squeezing Abe’s hand and pecking him on the cheek for good measure. “Technically you did too!”

“Yeah, yeah whatever. Enjoy your spoils while I sit on my one percent. One stinking percent. Half of one percent actually. Unbelievable.” Anna pulls the keys out of her purse for her brand new M7 BMW. It’s a nice car, elegant with a touch of sport like Anna. Abe laughs at her as she gets into it as dramatically as she possibly can while lamenting her one percent.

“I’m sorry for your suffering, Anna.”

“For the record Abe,” she says, leaning out of the window. “I like the house.”

“You know, I chose this house because in 1812, Charles Carroll--.”

“Yeah, someone in history did something, and I don’t care. Great, wonderful. Could have had a bigger house.” Abe’s not able to get another word in before Anna rolls the window up and drives away, revving the engine while she goes. Yep, definitely suits Anna.

As Anna drives away, Robert and Abe slowly make their way back up to the front door of their house. Robert takes his notebook out from where it’s situated under his arm and opens it up to retrieve a piece of old parchment colored paper. He hands it to Abe with a smug smile on his face. “I almost forgot to give you this.”

“What’s this?" 

“A map.” He starts to walk away from Abe, as the latter stands and stares at the map in his hands.

“A map? Where does it lead to?”

Robert shrugs and turns to walk backwards so that’s he’s facing Abe as he continues to walk away. “You’ll figure it out.”

It takes Abe approximately one half minute to piece together the painting that Robert’s trying to paint. Abe picks up his pace to catch up to Robert, but Robert starts to run back towards the house, Abe now hot on his trail. As the two race up the front steps, Abe now _knows_ that Robert is going to ruin his life. But in a good way now.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So a few more notes that I didn't want to include at the top of the work.
> 
> -The coffee shop that I used for Robert and Anna across the street from Trinity Church is called Bean and Bean, and it overlooks the graveyard that backs up to Rector Street. That's also coincidentally the yard that Hamilton's buried in, but that's not important.
> 
> -I realize that the name of the church sexton that hung the lanterns in Boston was named Robert Newman, not Thomas Newton. As stated on the IMDB Goofs page for this movie, it was done on purpose to play on Arnold's lack of knowledge.
> 
> Thank you for coming on this adventure with me. It was a trying one.

**Author's Note:**

> Hit me up at culperit.tumblr.com


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